Stalag Luft VIIIB

[Subdeacon Joe]

A FB find.

 

RAF Bomber Command Crews and Aircraft Pictures  · 

 

Dave Birrell  ·   · 

 

WINSTON PARKER’S PHOTO ALBUM -Shot down in a 419 Sqn Wellington and spending three years in Stalag Luft VIIIB, Winston came to know Bill Lawrence, a WAG who made a camera out of a Red Cross biscuit tin. From the Bomber Command Museum’s archives, read how he did it and look at some of his photos at:

https://www.bombercommandmuseumarchives.ca/s,stalag.html

 

F/Sgt. Winston Parker was an air-gunner aboard 419 Squadron Wellington X3467 (VR-N) when it was shot down on a raid to Hamburg during the night of 8/9 April 1942. His pilot was F/O A.B. Crighton and all six members of the crew were Canadians.

The aircraft was abandoned after fires broke out in both of the aircraft's engines. Five of the crew parachuted successfully and became Prisoners of War but P/O E.R. Howard was killed.

Winston became a prisoner in Stalag VIIIB where he stayed until he was forced to participate in 'The Long March' that began in January 1945.

Stalag VIII-B Lamsdorf was a German Army prisoner of war camp, later renumbered Stalag-344, located near the small town of Lamsdorf (now called Łambinowice) in Silesia. The camp initially occupied barracks built to house British and French prisoners in World War I. At this same location there had been a prisoner camp during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71.

All but the final photo from Winston's album were taken with a secret camera by Wireless Operator/Air Gunner Bill Lawrence in Stalag VIIIB 'Flieger' Compound. Bill made the camera from a Red Cross biscuit tin with the aid of two lenses which were smuggled into the main camp from an outside working party. After each shot, he had to move the film frame manually under the blanket of his bed while an accomplice watched out for the guards. He had friends who had access to the camp hospital and they obtained film and x-ray chemicals for developing it. Bill turned his bed into a darkroom, developing film under the blanket.

Although Winston didn't smoke, he received lots of cigarettes in his Red Cross parcels. He often used these to bribe the enemy guards to gain access to items such as lenses and film and chemicals from the hospital.

For the shots outside, the camera was concealed in a Red Cross food parcel box. Bill carried the box under his arm and had a hole cut in one end which he covered with his hand. As well, the prisoners had a secret, hidden radio, with which they were able to pick up BBC News broadcasts. They then wrote out the news and distributed it to others in the camp.

Winston's photos provide a window into the lives of Bomber Command Prisoners of War.

 

Group of prisoners with wrists tied during the 'typing up' period; Del Mooney facing camera.





2Hawkins (facing camera), Winston Parker and Dick Thornhill (backs to camera) with wrists tied.





The interior of Hut 16B

[Alpo]

Any idea what the "typing up" and the wrists being tied together are all about?

 

Your link took me to the first page, but since I'm not a member of Facebook it won't let me go any further.

[Subdeacon Joe]

11 hours ago, Alpo said:

Any idea what the "typing up" and the wrists being tied together are all about?

 

Your link took me to the first page, but since I'm not a member of Facebook it won't let me go any further.

 

That's why I posted the second link.  It takes you to the Bomber Command Museum website.

 

As to your questions, I have no idea.

[Alpo]

Book I first discovered in junior high school called THE WOODEN HORSE. True story of British escape from a World War II prison camp.

 

In the book it mentioned many things that had been made from klim tins.

 

And looky there. Klim tins.

 

 

Klim, by the way, is a brand of powdered milk. Milk spelled backwards - klim.

[Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967]

Reminds me of the "pinhole cameras" we made from shoe boxes when we were kids.  Well... some of us more "seasoned" folk remember 'em.

 

And "crystal set" radios!  My Uncle Bob taught me to make 'em with a cigar box, copper wire coil made from wrapping the wire around a toilet paper roll, and a lead-sulfide "crystal" formed from adding sulfer to lead melted in a can and cast in one of my aunt's purloined thimbles, and a "cat's whisker" of copper wire and a sewing needle.  More wire for an antenna and an ancient surplus headset or tiny piezolectric ear plug.  

[Trailrider #896]

My crystal set came in a kit. Worked pretty well...when I wasn't listening to my folks' super-hetrodyne radio for The Lone Ranger or Sgt. Preston and his dog Yukon King. 

[Sedalia Dave]

On 10/11/2024 at 8:30 AM, Alpo said:

Any idea what the "typing up" and the wrists being tied together are all about?

 

Your link took me to the first page, but since I'm not a member of Facebook it won't let me go any further.

 

On 10/11/2024 at 8:17 PM, Subdeacon Joe said:

 

That's why I posted the second link.  It takes you to the Bomber Command Museum website.

 

As to your questions, I have no idea.

 

Did a lot of research and as best as I can deduce the Germans were tying of the wrists of the allied POWs because the British tied the wrists of German POWs captured at Dieppe.

 

The British did this because there were so many POWs that they didn't have time to properly search them until they were transported to England. 

 

Initially allied POWS had their wrists tied. After a few days the ropes were replaced with handcuffs.

 

Reading the stories it appears there was a lot of tit for tat by both sides when it came to the treatment of POWs.