p.o.w in BAB 21

[mrs bongo]

hi  all
 im looking for any info regarding William j heckford  who was in the navy he was a pow ww2 in bab21  im not to sure where to start looking
kind regards
 

[ScouseBoy]

What was his rank in the Navy?    Was he Merchant Navy or Royal Navy?

[mrs bongo]

hi 
all I know he was ab    p/ssx28765 royal navy
 kind regards

[cardboard]

have been told it was a forced labour camp.

Just wanted to say that Bau und Arbeits Battalions were not forced labour, even though the work wasn't pleasent.

Prisoner of War working parties WERE forced labour at the point of a gun.  They could be working anything from 8 to 18 hours a day on as little as 250 grams of bread - usually erstatz bread made from potato starch and extended with sawdust - and a litre of soup a day.   Most of these pow would rather have had nothing to do than have been forced to work for the enemy as unpaid labour slaving for the Nazi regime. Many were forced to continue working even though they were sick or injured. At the end of the war many of these POW's returned home having lost half of their pre war body weight.

BAB 20 at Reigersfeld was one of several labour camps in the area of Blechhammer in Ober Silesia.  The POW's in BAB 20 were worked in the area of Heydebreck, also known as Blechhammer South, where they were used as forced labour to build factories that were to produce the fuel of benzene.  A POW at BAB 20 named Joseph Gribben was shot by a German guard, Gerfreiter Sontag, on 27th March 1942 for refusing to work as he was unable to lift and move a heavily laden wheelbarrow - National Archives WO30912240 (598478 )

The German government known as the Weimar Republic 1919 - 1933 was a signatory to the 1929 Geneva Convention.  However the Nazi regime did not recognise the obligations of the Weimar Republic.  Following the war SHAEFE - Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe and the International Red Cross found little evidence of adherence to the convention by the Nazi regime towards POW's.

 

[drdl]

Here are my father's memories of BAB21 written years later.  It includes his capture in 1940 near Abbeville and escape in Dec 1944

[mrs bongo]

thank you all for your help

[cardboard]

thank you all for your help

A statement by a former prisoner of war in regard to BAB 21 that was used at the Nuremberg trials in relation to ill treatment of prisoners of war, and may be of interest around your research.

" Hauptman Spaht was the Commanding Officer, and he was in command of 2 Company Guards.  The guards of the camp frequently beat up pow's for no reason at all.  It was almost a daily occurrence - rifle butts, kicking, striking.  Marine Tuck was badly beaten.  If complaints were made to him (Hauptman Spaht) he always supported the guards.  Prisoners from sick bay were forced to leave their beds and work."

There is also an article on 'Pegasus Archive ' on the air raid of 2nd December 1944 that hit POW camps BAB 21 & E3, and resulted in deaths and injuries to POW's.

[cardboard]

Hi drdl,

Very interesting account, along with the recurring theme of being short of food, and the lice, which are common features in most testaments.

This is actually the first account that I have seen about BAB 21 and the area of Blechhammer that does not mention the allied bombing of the area, which happened from 7th July 1944 through to the end of 1944.

This is not a criticism:
May he have been mistaken with the passage of time, when he says that they set off on the march away from BAB 21, and especially mentioning over 1000 pow's setting out, from the area in December 1944, as BAB 21 and the other camps at Blechhammer were evacuated at the end of January 1945, mostly on 21st and 22nd January. Blechhammer was taken by the Russians on 26th January.

[drdl]

Yes, it is certainly possible that he got the dates wrong, as he wrote down his memories many years later.  He mentions in one 1944 entry that the expected bombing had not begun.  Regarding the Long March, he says the entire camp was marched out in Dec 1944 but then inexplicably marched back and then marched out again the next day.  He and his friend stayed on in Dorf Lager and a Russian patrol arrived a few days later, which as you say was late January - so his dates don't fit.