Lincolnshire regiment help please?

Hiya ramacal he was Deffo 4 Lincoln's but would you want me to get the service records before you are willing to share the war diary??

5

 

Vicky,

Did you see his POW Liberation Questionnaire?

Regards,

Nick

 

Hi Vicky

PM sent.

Cheers

Rob

 

I did Thankyou Nick, although I don't quite understand what it is lol

 

Hi Vicky,

Returning Prisioners of War (not all) completed a form on which they wrote details of their capture. A lot of then just wrote name, rank, service number, unit, date of capture and where. If they had another information, such as trying to escape, maltreatment, it was useful in prosecuting war criminals. In this case, the form is very useful, in that it confirms he served in 4 Lincolns in Norway when he was captured. A quicker answer than applying for and waiting for a service record to arrive.

Regards

Rob

 

Vicky,

As Rob says, this is as completed by your Granddad after he returned to England, before he was given leave, the only difference is that l think they were all asked to complete one, it is just that quite a few Army guys especially 'Forgot'.

These are held at Kew and are an interesting place for research.

Regards,

Nick

 

I would like to add that I have come across quite a few men captured 1940 - 1943 for example and known to be POW's that do not appear in the 'official' POW file at the TNA (and hence Ancestry).

Another example I came across yesterday was:

Wing Commander Roland Robert Standford Tuck DSO, DFC (+2 Bars), captured on 28 Jan 1942, and imprisoned in Stalag Luft III - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Stanford_Tuck I have been unable to find him on the nominal roll of POW's. At the moment this would also apply to about 80% of the ex POW's names I have found who where repatriated via the port of Odessa (Jan - Aug 1945)

TD

 

Is it going to be worth applying for his service records or would there be no other info on it that I haven't already found?

 

My grandad is on the back row, far right.

 

Hi Vicky, yes it's worth applying for his record, as I did for my Father, I was able to research from his first joining the army to the point he was put on reserve list. So I now have a story to write of his life. Hope you find this helpful.

Best regards

Lotus7.

 

Lotus, it's all been very eYe opening and you have all been so helpful. My dad is going to talk to my Nan about his service records. I have sent them everything I have found out and they're as curious as me!

 

Hi Vicky, for me it was some stories that my Father told us, his army records, his medals, and photographs etc, not forgetting lots of help from the forum guys. It's been worth while putting them all together to create a history of his journey through that period. I hope you get his records and maybe you too will write up his story one day for your family.

Regards

Lotus7.

 

My grandad didn't speak about his time in the army, he used to scare us with stories of eating grass through cage bars lol now I know that is most likely not true!

 

Don't disregard the story about eating grass. My Dad was part of a crew that hunted down rats and mice for meat to put in the stew. They were sure the 'Tea' that they brewed was really just grass.

 

Sadly I was only about 10 when he died so I don't remember too much but the cage story stuck in my head. I'd be interested to know what they actually did eat during their time in the camp.

 

Vicky,

The word ersatz was used which means replacement or substitute so what ever was lacking would be replaced by something else, for instance ground acorn coffee. Bread made from potato, tobacco from grass, etc.

There diet was helped greatly by the Red Cross Parcels though, not only in terms of food and a few luxuries like chocolate but also cigarettes to barter with.

Regards,

Nick

 

There must be many here on the forum who could tell you what they had to eat and drink in camps. As like many soldiers they supplemented the diet with what ever they got there hands on. My Father told us of the time they had a Pig (it was roaming in a field,,, that's what he told us) because they were so hungry and the unit all ended up with Disentre, pig revenge is all Dad said.

Lotus7.

 

Go here and read what life was like in the camps

http://ww2talk.com/forums/topic/20019-welcome-aboard-snowy/

Ron

 

My Dad was kept in a German PW Hospital in Rennes and in June 1944 the medical staff there estimated the available meals provided 300 Calories per man. In July 1944 it was up to 600 Calories and eventually 1100 Calories. So imagine that you could only eat one black bread sandwich with one pat of butter and a thin layer of marmalade for the whole day for several weeks. That was what men who had been getting 3500 Calories a day before capture were getting to sustain themselves. That is why the two cats at the hospital disappeared in the second week of June and all the rats and mice disappeared by the first week of July.

In July my Dad went over the wall, actually through the back wall, to get unripened pears from a couple of trees he could see from the 2nd floor of the hospital. He and his friend ate as many as they could before the Germans shot at them to get them back into the hospital. He was sick as a dog from the unripened fruit but his stomach was full for a day.

The men in the hospital never got any Red Cross parcels until the Gestapo fled their headquarters across the street from the hospital and PWs sent teams over to retrieve food from the HQ. The Gestapo had rooms full of food and liquor which were liberated to feed the guys in the hospital.