How strange, but her we are, a mass of human flesh and blood, striving hard to keep the body alive, yet under these conditions men are giving much thought to the needs of the soul. Thus, in Bengasi camp, men were being drawn together in a bond of brotherhood, as members one of another - whose God is the Lord!
Every evening, one would find in the camp little groups of men drawn together in the bond of love and fellowship, to thank God for His preserving power and praying earnestly that He would bring them safely through this time of tribulation. It was nothing to sit for hours in these meetings and listen to the story of what God meant to Bill Brown or Jack Jones and in the crowd, to hear the heart-rending sobs of a man who had through these testimonies had been convinced of his need for Christ in his life. One was reminded of the scripture; 'In this world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world'. How strange it was that when under stress and strain men began to turn to God, and this was certainly the case in Bengasi camp.
One of the fellows who led these meetings, Harry, a grand lad from Manchester would during the day cut the hair of all who required it. When he had finished cutting, the recipient would ask 'How much?'. 'All I want is a smile.' A smile, yes, indeed, a smile was one of those rare gifts in those days. The grim determination to live was the picture on the face of most of the men.
Harry was not to see many more months on this earthly sphere, for he died, alas, in a prison camp in Italy after spending several terrible weeks in Swani Ben Adem camp, west of Bengasi. This camp became known as the 'hell camp' amongst the POWs. When I heard of Harry's death, i was confident that his example of Christ-likeness was a real blessing to all with whom he had come in contact.
I have in my possession today a dilapidated New Testament which Harry gave me in Bengasi camp. In the flyleaf is a message written by a friend of his. It is faint now, but I can just read the words 'To one who became a brother to me. May God bless and keep you always until we meet again. Ernest 23/11/41'. Harry had become a brother to many of us, and his smiling face always a pleasure to behold.
Towards the end of July, the RAF began to bomb the harbour at Bengasi, and at night now, the air raid warnings would sound and we would sit and gaze at the myriad colours of tracer shells whirling through space, hoping that none of the planes would be hit. Soon, we heard a shout and the lads started to point at the sky; lo and behold there were 15 Flying Fortresses. What a sight! Two were shot down by excellent AA fire, but not before two ammunition ships had been blown up in the harbour and mines had been laid!
Ant so life went on - my abscess had burst and my leg was healing up very slowly. The sand fleas were becoming very annoying, and lice were marching over our bodies in their hundreds. It was now a daily ritual to strip off and kill every louse and eggs one could find. Most of us were still wearing the clothes in which we were captured. They had not been washed, hence the armies of lice, lice, LICE! Nearly every man had grown a beard, not through choice, but one could not afford such a luxury with only a pint of water a day.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Bengasi camp was situated two miles outside the town, at the side of vast salt flats, and to escape meant traversing these on one side, the open desert and to the West, the sea to the North and the barracks to the East.
Betweeen July and September '42, that camp; had about 30,000 prisoners behind the wire. Men from Tobruk, Gasala, Knightbridge Mersah Matru and El Alamein. The men captured in Tobruk felt they had been betrayed for '30 pieces of silver'! A percentage of the men were fortunate and had small bivouacs - made out of Italian groundsheets - and although no good against the cold nights and rain (if any) were indeed an asset against the hot desert sun.
Life in camp was indeed grim, for hunger, malaria, dysentery and malnutrition were not taking their toll on the men. As aforementioned, we were in groups of 50 for the purpose of ration issue and daily roll-call. Every day at noon, the senior NCO went, usually with two OR's from each group, outside the wire under escort to the Italian food stores across the road to collect the daily ration. This was one hard biscuit, 4" square and half an inch thick, a small tin of bully beef, which was in actual fact, horse flesh; a cigarette ration of two per man. Water was issued late in the afternoon at the rate of one pint per person which was to be used for washing and drinking. The water cart often forgot to deliver, so the lads just had to go without.
Once a week, we were issued with a hot mash of lentils and later had black bread issued instead of the biscuit; although weighing only 150g and tasting of sawdust, it was a change from hard tack.
Sanitation was terrible, and in due course was responsible for most of the sickness in the camp. It was so crowded that many men slept along the side of the latrines - if they could be called that! Long trenches 15 feet long and about six feet deep were dug alongside the wire. No seating accommodation provided, no privacy! So many of us were suffering from dysentery that it was not long before another pit had to be dug, and as it was impossible to fill in the old trenches, the horrible stench attracted flies by the million and spread the disease. It became a common sight to find a man dead at the side of these pits, and indeed, sometimes in the pit.
Daily at 10am, an English officer, a POW like ourselves, called at the camp to give medical attention. He and his orderly worked for hours in the sweltering head. The queue for treatment appeared to be endless, and sometimes the officer had to call it a day when the issue of aspirin, Epsom salts and quinine had been used up. It took me three days of queuing to get my leg attended to, and when the orderly saw my leg, stated that he had nothing to put on it, so I must just try to keep it clean.
At one period in the camp, statistics of death were as high as 20 men per day. After weeks of the camp diet, most of us looked like skeletons covered with a thin layer of skin, and so weak that each time we attempted to stand up, we inevitably fell down again due to blackouts and giddiness.
It now became necessary to obtain more food, or slowly starve to death. The Italian guards wanted Egyptian pounds as they thought they would be spending their next leave in Cairo or Alexandra. Our predicament was a golden opportunity to get the money. So they started offering loaves of bread, the same loaf which was our daily issue. No wonder the ration was short every day. The ration had been cut recently to 4 loaves between 5 men. At first, these guards charged £1 per loaf - later the price went up to £5 a loaf because of the demand. Twenty cigarettes cost anything from £1 - 5 - 0 to £3, and as money was expended, men sold wedding rings, watches, fountain pens and even their boots for bread. How the Italians gloated over our misfortunes cannot be expressed!
I saw men sell wedding rings, eat the bread of exchange, and then cry like a child, full of remorse.
A colleague of mine wanted a smoke. I had money but he had not, thus he offered me his overcoat for £3. I haggled and said it was more important for him to be warm than have a smoke, but of no avail, he just had to smoke, and with tears running down his face, he said he would kill himself if I did not make the exchange. I took the coat, he the £3 - he was satisfied. So was I, for I could now sleep at night.
Betweeen July and September '42, that camp; had about 30,000 prisoners behind the wire. Men from Tobruk, Gasala, Knightbridge Mersah Matru and El Alamein. The men captured in Tobruk felt they had been betrayed for '30 pieces of silver'! A percentage of the men were fortunate and had small bivouacs - made out of Italian groundsheets - and although no good against the cold nights and rain (if any) were indeed an asset against the hot desert sun.
Life in camp was indeed grim, for hunger, malaria, dysentery and malnutrition were not taking their toll on the men. As aforementioned, we were in groups of 50 for the purpose of ration issue and daily roll-call. Every day at noon, the senior NCO went, usually with two OR's from each group, outside the wire under escort to the Italian food stores across the road to collect the daily ration. This was one hard biscuit, 4" square and half an inch thick, a small tin of bully beef, which was in actual fact, horse flesh; a cigarette ration of two per man. Water was issued late in the afternoon at the rate of one pint per person which was to be used for washing and drinking. The water cart often forgot to deliver, so the lads just had to go without.
Once a week, we were issued with a hot mash of lentils and later had black bread issued instead of the biscuit; although weighing only 150g and tasting of sawdust, it was a change from hard tack.
Sanitation was terrible, and in due course was responsible for most of the sickness in the camp. It was so crowded that many men slept along the side of the latrines - if they could be called that! Long trenches 15 feet long and about six feet deep were dug alongside the wire. No seating accommodation provided, no privacy! So many of us were suffering from dysentery that it was not long before another pit had to be dug, and as it was impossible to fill in the old trenches, the horrible stench attracted flies by the million and spread the disease. It became a common sight to find a man dead at the side of these pits, and indeed, sometimes in the pit.
Daily at 10am, an English officer, a POW like ourselves, called at the camp to give medical attention. He and his orderly worked for hours in the sweltering head. The queue for treatment appeared to be endless, and sometimes the officer had to call it a day when the issue of aspirin, Epsom salts and quinine had been used up. It took me three days of queuing to get my leg attended to, and when the orderly saw my leg, stated that he had nothing to put on it, so I must just try to keep it clean.
At one period in the camp, statistics of death were as high as 20 men per day. After weeks of the camp diet, most of us looked like skeletons covered with a thin layer of skin, and so weak that each time we attempted to stand up, we inevitably fell down again due to blackouts and giddiness.
It now became necessary to obtain more food, or slowly starve to death. The Italian guards wanted Egyptian pounds as they thought they would be spending their next leave in Cairo or Alexandra. Our predicament was a golden opportunity to get the money. So they started offering loaves of bread, the same loaf which was our daily issue. No wonder the ration was short every day. The ration had been cut recently to 4 loaves between 5 men. At first, these guards charged £1 per loaf - later the price went up to £5 a loaf because of the demand. Twenty cigarettes cost anything from £1 - 5 - 0 to £3, and as money was expended, men sold wedding rings, watches, fountain pens and even their boots for bread. How the Italians gloated over our misfortunes cannot be expressed!
I saw men sell wedding rings, eat the bread of exchange, and then cry like a child, full of remorse.
A colleague of mine wanted a smoke. I had money but he had not, thus he offered me his overcoat for £3. I haggled and said it was more important for him to be warm than have a smoke, but of no avail, he just had to smoke, and with tears running down his face, he said he would kill himself if I did not make the exchange. I took the coat, he the £3 - he was satisfied. So was I, for I could now sleep at night.
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