I recently read that
handwritten Christmas cards are rapidly becoming scarcities. Emails, text
messages and social media posts take precedence when exchanging festive
greetings. I don’t have a smart phone so I won’t be sending and seasonal
missives via text but I can certainly attest to the rarity of Christmas cards
dropping into my post box. And when I sat down to compile my list of
recipients—largely based on who sent me cards last year—I realised that I have
a very short list. So, it seems, despite the care Hallmark and Co put into their
designs, Christmas cards are becoming increasingly more irrelevant.
The first Christmas cards
were created because of a commercial imperative. Apparently, back in the 1840s,
one of the men who set up the British post office wanted to generate more
custom so worked with an artistic friend to design a Christmas card. People
adopted the practice and a new tradition developed, expanding to the United
States by the end of the decade, and throughout Europe by the turn of the
century. In 1915, with the establishment of the aforementioned Hallmark—still
one of the world’s biggest card makers—commercialisation of seasonal greetings
was well and truly entrenched.
Lifted from the Australian War Memorial https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/B02130/
451 Squadron Christmas card sent by Alec Arnel in 1943 to his sweetheart, Margery Grey. Courtesy of Alec Arnel.
Despite the commercial origins, exchanging Christmas cards became an important ritual and even Great War servicemen adopted it to send messages to their loved ones back at home. Those serving in the Second World War followed their lead in adopting this meaningful tradition. So important had it become to them that they couldn’t just abandon it because a fellow happened to fetch up in a prisoner of war camp in Germany. Of course, the prisoners—or ‘Kriegies’ as they dubbed themselves from the German kriegesgefangener (prisoners or war)—couldn’t pop out to the local greeting card purveyor to select something pretty to send home. Happily, ‘The Camp’, an English language newspaper, came to their rescue. Printed weekly in Berlin, ‘The Camp’ was distributed throughout the German prison camp network. Apparently—and I can’t verify this—it had a German editor, who was assisted by one or two ‘renegade Britishers’ and Calton Younger of Centre Compound, for one, considered it ‘an insidious form of propaganda’. It produced a number of Christmas cards for the allied prisoners of war.
Harold Fry
sent this one to his fiancée in 1941 (she received it on 12 March 1942!). Courtesy of Pat Martin.
Tony Gordon sent this one
to his loved ones in 1942. Courtesy of Drew Gordon.
Al Hake, George Archer,
Justin O’Byrne and Tom Leigh, all sent this image in 1942.
‘Christmas’, for the
Australian prisoners of war in Stalag Luft III, was not just confined to the
moment they filled out the address on the back of a card. It was something that
was on their minds for months. Appreciating how long how it took for mail to
travel from Germany to Australia, Al Hake wished his wife, Noela, a merry
Christmas in his 8 September 1942 letter. (He was in East Compound at the time but later moved to North Compound.) George Archer of East Compound started the count down
on 13 November 1942. ‘Six weeks to Christmas’, and then on 20 December, ‘One
week to Christmas’. Justin O’Byrne, a one-time denizen of Room 3, Block 64 , East Compound AKA ‘Australia House’ looked to Christmas as a deadline for release, noting in an April 1942 letter,
‘I had great hopes of seeing London by August but still think that I will be
there for Christmas—here’s hoping!!’ By 1 November, he realised this was naught
but a pipe dream—for the time being: ‘My hope to be with you at Christmas will
have to be postponed but I feel sure it won’t be long before we are all
together again.’
George Archer at Oflag XXB Schubin, 1942. Courtesy of David Archer.
Justin—who had been a
prisoner of war since August 1941—continued to think positively only to again
have his hopes dashed. On 19 November 1943 he told his family ‘I had great hopes
that I would be home for Christmas but no such luck’. But, he was still
optimistic that he would be home by the next one. After a quiet Christmas in
Stalag Luft III’s East Compound—enlivened by enough raisin wine ‘which we
distilled and made a brew strong enough to give most of us a good “lift”’—and a
New Year’s Eve where ‘we gathered round the piano and sang songs till midnight
and then sang “Auld Lang Syne”’—Justin wished that ‘I can definitely say that I
will see you all before the next one’. He maintained his optimism. Alluding in
his 15 July 1944 letter to the recent D-Day operations and an apparent imminent
release, he was ‘full of good cheer now that “the day” is near and will be
seeing you all soon’.
Justin O’Byrne in better times. Courtesy of Anne O’Byrne.
Justin was not alone in optimistically
pinning his hopes on liberation ‘by Christmas’. It was perfectly natural to
settle on a psychologically acceptable end date to confinement
and given the importance of Christmas, it is not surprising that that was the
day the majority focused on. In April 1943, ‘when Easter had come and gone’
Bert Comber—who was at the time in an Italian POW camp—‘realised how quickly
the months slip by’ and thought that ‘perhaps Christmas will see me home’.
Eleven months later, George Archer was thinking of his Uncle James who was
approaching the ‘century mark’, and asked his parents to let his uncle know
that he was ‘looking forward to seeing him around about Christmas 1944’.
Bert Comber in Italy, 1942. Courtesy of Cath McNamara.
In August that year, Colin Phelps of East Compound told his parents that ‘hopes of the war being over by Christmas are very high’. By November, however, ‘prospects of the war ending soon have receded at the moment. We once thought we might be back by Christmas’.
Not everyone looked to Christmas as the deadline for homecoming. On 6 February 1944, Justin O’Byrne told his family that ‘our choir is plugging away at Handel’s Messiah’. One of those contributing to that ‘excellent performance’ was North Compound’s Len Netherway. He had a fine singing voice and was one of the first tenors. Much as he enjoyed singing, he wouldn’t have been disappointed if he didn’t take the stage on opening night. ‘Hope we don’t get a chance to finish it’; his thoughts were firmly on their eventual liberation. The show, however, went on and the uplifting music was a far cry from Len’s renditions of ‘The Yodelling Bagman’ and ‘All Set and Saddled’ which featured at a kitchen tea at Quantong, Victoria, back in March 1941. Even so, it seems the overall result was a polished performance. According to the official history of RAAF operations in the Second World War, the choir’s ‘most ambitious’ project resulted in ‘an excellent performance’.
Not everyone looked to Christmas as the deadline for homecoming. On 6 February 1944, Justin O’Byrne told his family that ‘our choir is plugging away at Handel’s Messiah’. One of those contributing to that ‘excellent performance’ was North Compound’s Len Netherway. He had a fine singing voice and was one of the first tenors. Much as he enjoyed singing, he wouldn’t have been disappointed if he didn’t take the stage on opening night. ‘Hope we don’t get a chance to finish it’; his thoughts were firmly on their eventual liberation. The show, however, went on and the uplifting music was a far cry from Len’s renditions of ‘The Yodelling Bagman’ and ‘All Set and Saddled’ which featured at a kitchen tea at Quantong, Victoria, back in March 1941. Even so, it seems the overall result was a polished performance. According to the official history of RAAF operations in the Second World War, the choir’s ‘most ambitious’ project resulted in ‘an excellent performance’.
Len Netherway, Stalag Luft III, 1943.
Messiah program, 1944. Courtesy of Mike Netherway.
Despite his hopes of
seeing Uncle James at Christmas time, George Archer was still in Stalag Luft
III and, on 17 December 1944, instead of celebrating with family and friends,
he was writing about the ‘very nippy’ weather and anticipating ‘a White
Christmas’. The camp had suffered severe rationing for months but even so, he
was planning a good celebration. ‘After many weeks of saving’ and scrimping
enough ingredients to work with, ‘I made the Mess Christmas cake last week—14
lbs—From appearances it’s excellent and we now await the day to bash it’.
At 21 and a half pounds, Bruce Lumsden’s cake was bigger than George’s,
but then, with 18 men in his mess in the Belaria Compound, it had to go further. But it was just as
precious. Representing diligent scrounging and careful husbanding from Red
Cross parcels, it included a chocolate D-bar, semolina, crumbled American
biscuits, raisins, prunes, sugar, molasses, margarine, Klim powdered milk, four
4 cups of pre-cooked barley, a tin of orange juice, a spoonful of coffee,
crumbled Reich bread and a pinch of salt. Iced cakes may have been long-banned
in England, but not so in Stalag Luft III. ‘The cake was iced, of course’,
recalled Bruce.
‘Loaf sugar was ground fine using a bottle as a roller. Then one pound of sugar
was mixed with one pound of margarine and 4 ozs. of Klim to make an icing that
spread easily and did not run.’ As if such culinary magnificence wasn’t enough.
‘For some reason that I cannot now explain, the cake was given a filling’,
consisting of chocolate, sugar, molasses and margarine.
Bruce Lumsden, before Kriegiedom.
The recipe for the 21+ pound cake, recorded by Bruce Lumsden’s roommate, Cy Borsht. Courtesy of Cy Borsht.
East Compound’s Harry Train, who had
already had two Christmases in captivity, experienced his ‘first sober’ one in
Germany in 1944. ‘The Group Captain gave parole that there would be no more
brews and in any case food has been rather short for anything like that.’ (It
seems that not everyone honoured Group Captain Wilson’s request. Canadian Ray
Silver, in his memoir The Last of the Gladiators,
recalled that they had ‘quite a bash’ on Christmas Eve after drinking their
home made brew, and Welshman Ken Rees recorded in Lie in the Dark and Listen that on Christmas Day ‘we started on the
hooch, complimented by a tiny amount of weak and tasteless beer supplied by the
goons’.)
Harry Train in Sydney, pre-embarkation. Courtesy of Peter Mayo.
Instead of the (by now
usual) half Red Cross parcels, ‘we went on to full parcels for Xmas week’. They
were supplemented by the very welcome American parcels which ‘arrived in the
nick of time’. Harry’s room shared the unheard of luxury of ‘six Xmas parcels
and two ordinary ones’. Their festive spoils included 12 ounces of turkey and
some Vienna sausages’ and Harry considered it ‘quite the best meal I have had
in Germany’. Recognising that ‘one’s stomach shrinks or something’, Harry and
his friends sensibly split their Christmas dinner over two meals ‘and coped all
right, but most of the messes who kept it for one “ginormous” bash couldn’t
finish the meal’.
Some managed to finish their meal, but they suffered for it. Bruce Lumsden recalled how his mess fell to the lure of tin plates ‘laden with a repast that seemed royal to our starving eyes for its abundance and to our unaccustomed palates for its tantalising flavours’. He and his friends could not help but give into gluttony, even when they ‘began to receive internal warnings’ that they would have to pay for it. ‘For months we had not tasted tea, and so a mug of hot, strong Orange Pekoe tea was the fitting climax. But hardly was it drunk, before one after another was seized with severe pains and gripping cramps, and, struggling away from the table, each man climbed painfully into his bunk where he lay writhing and groaning.’ Despite their agony, it had been worth it. ‘There were pains, but there were no complaints.’
Contents of an American Christmas parcel, 1944.
Some managed to finish their meal, but they suffered for it. Bruce Lumsden recalled how his mess fell to the lure of tin plates ‘laden with a repast that seemed royal to our starving eyes for its abundance and to our unaccustomed palates for its tantalising flavours’. He and his friends could not help but give into gluttony, even when they ‘began to receive internal warnings’ that they would have to pay for it. ‘For months we had not tasted tea, and so a mug of hot, strong Orange Pekoe tea was the fitting climax. But hardly was it drunk, before one after another was seized with severe pains and gripping cramps, and, struggling away from the table, each man climbed painfully into his bunk where he lay writhing and groaning.’ Despite their agony, it had been worth it. ‘There were pains, but there were no complaints.’
Bruce Lumsden post-Christmas ‘bash’ with full tummy. Courtesy of Margaret and Jamie Bradbeer.
Syd Wickham’s mess were not as diligent as George Archer and Harry Train
at saving for future feasts. They tried hard, ‘through economic use of food by
community sharing’ and ‘usually had a small reserve for Christmas or special
occasions’ but they often had to raid the stores when parcels were scarce. When
their reserves were almost depleted, they called a meeting to decide whether
they would ‘eat the precious remaining morsels or re-ration to extend it for
another few days’, thus scotching plans for any prospective big bash. They
never got as far as voting because Les Dixon ‘usually came out with the only
religious quotation I ever heard from him “let us eat it now, The Lord Will
Provide”’. And so, they put their trust in God ‘because he was so persuasive. Miraculously
within a day or two the Lord fulfilled his promise, new parcels would arrive’.
Syd Wickham, Stalag Luft III, 1942.
Les might have had an ulterior motive for wanting to eat everything at
once. Some time ago, in another camp where conditions were even worse and
rationing even direr, Les had been saving up a potato for his birthday, because,
according to Justin O’Byrne, it was ‘something to look forward to’. Every time he came
across a bigger one, he swapped it, and ate the smaller one because ‘he wanted to celebrate it by
having a bigger potato’. Les was desperately counting the days down until he
could savour his birthday treat when a fellow prisoner, not realising that
‘thou shalt not steal’ was perhaps the key Kriegie commandment, swiped it and
ate it. ‘It was the
unforgiveable thing for anyone to steal anything else from a fellow prisoner.’ Justin O’Byrne
recalled Les’ reaction:
‘…the ferocity that Les used on showing his anger at having lost his potato! He
got [the thief] down, and we had to physically drag him away from his throat,
because of his anger in this man doing such a dastardly thing’. Without
condoning the theft Justin tried to be even handed about the incident. ‘…it
gives an idea of the relativity of values, you know, of life itself, how it’s a
primitive and basic thing to have food when you’re hungry; your stomach needs
food’. And so, perhaps Les had learned from bitter experience that you ate what
you could, when you could.
Les Dixon, Oflag XXB, Schubin. Courtesy David Archer.
Treats were
important and made Kriegie life better. Syd Wickham didn’t record the arrival
of the welcome American parcels for Christmas 1944 but he did remember that
season’s special treat. With the temperature down to minus 15 degrees, it was just
right for making ice cream. ‘With Christmas a day away, we made a thick mixture
of powdered milk and water, threw in a little sugar, very little, and mixed it
up in our water jug.’ Then, they packed the jug in ice, in their coal box and
left it outside the window. After it started to freeze, the denizens of East
Compound’s ‘Australia House’, all took it in turns to beat
it up into an aerated mixture, which, happily for the hungry crew, increased
the quantity. Then, left outside overnight, voila! ‘Ice cream—of sorts’.
Klim (‘milk’ reversed) powder: an essential ingredient for Kriegie ice cream. Lifted from ‘the web’ but I forgot to save the reference. Sorry.
Despite depleting
their store cupboard, ‘Australia House’ still managed a Christmas cake—of
sorts. On the big day, Tom Walker crushed up some soda biscuits and mixed the
crumbs with raisins, condensed milk and any other ‘delectable items’ they could
scrounge. Along with items from their normal half parcel, ‘the meal looked
good’. Sadly, Syd didn’t have a chance to savour it. The water pool had frozen
over beautifully and so Les and Syd decided to don their ice skates before
dinner. ‘I was twirling about trying something fancy or just putting on an act
with plenty of room to move as we were the only two there, when a couple of
fighter aircraft flew low overhead.’ Les saw them and cried out ‘look!’ Syd
glanced up quickly, over-balanced and fell flat on his face. The next thing he
knew, he was sitting on the edge of his bunk, skates still on, with a grazed
and bleeding nose and split and swollen lips. He was in such a state that he
didn’t feel like eating, and ‘so I sat and watched my roommates eat their Christmas
Dinner’. Happily, they didn’t scoff all of it. They saved Syd’s share, ‘but it
was days before I could eat it.’
Les Dixon and Tom Walker, Oflag XXI B, Schubin, 1942. Courtesy of Anne O’Byrne.
Syd Wickham and Justin O’Byrne, Oflag XXI B, Schubin, 1942. Courtesy of Anne O’Byrne.
As Syd recovered from his non-combat wounds, others displayed more success on the ice rink. After having ‘a very good Christmas here despite being behind the wire’, Colin Phelps noted that ‘the big ice rink is in full swing and we had music from an amplifier’. So popular had the rink become that, three days after Christmas, ‘there was skating while it was snowing’. There was also a ‘small fun fair using cigarette currency. I won seven hundred on a horse race’.
Colin Phelps, Stalag Luft III, 1944.
As his first
Christmas in captivity loomed, North Compound’s Alec Arnel was looking homewards and, on 11
November 1944, imagined that his school teacher sweetheart, Margery, would be ‘thinking
of Xmas and a well-earned vac[ation]’. His thoughts then returned to Stalag
Luft III and a Christmas with few of the trimmings. ‘Mmmm. I could go for a
turkey and plum pud in a big way. Talking about pud our parcel shortage has
called for ingenuity in the cooking department. One outcome is a Reich-bread
pud which has to be seen to be believed. However it helps to fill the aching
void.’ But an empty stomach was not the only void he felt. ‘Merry Xmas dear
girl. Maybe there will come again a day when the world no longer lies between
us at Xmas-tide.’ Alec ‘expected little in the way of Christmas cheer’ and a
few weeks later was overwhelmed at his ‘amazing good fortune of receiving nine
letters—and what is more important five of them were from the girl with the
laughing eyes. These were my first letters in Kriegiedom’—he had been captured
on 29 June 1944—and were all forwarded on from my squadron’. Christmas in a
prisoner of war camp could never be like it was a home. Even so, the Kriegies
did their best and, ‘on Xmas eve we held special church services and sang again
the old carols. Our minds wandered far away and nostalgia caused this Xmas to
be the quietest most reflective I have ever known’.
Alec Arnel with 451 Squadron Hurricane. Courtesy of Alec Arnel.
Ronnie Baines of North Compound, who had
been captured on 18 November 1942, did not expect wonders from his third
Christmas as a prisoner of war and, despite the long-term plans for the Messiah
performance and the Christmas service, noticed that ‘very few prisoners made
any attempts at a “Merry Xmas”’. He was not in a particularly jolly mood as he
felt the pinch of the tight rationing. A typical December main meal—taken at
3.30 pm—consisted of two tins of salmon, some boiled spuds and cabbage, a
packet of boiled prunes, boiled barley and milk and coffee split between eight
men. By 11 December 1944, Ronnie was ‘feeling very hungry’ and was suffering a
‘terrific cold’. On the 23rd, they ‘received our parcels of food, American R[ed]
C[ross] very good’ but, with their ‘tin turkey and pudding, sweets and a lot of
junk’, they were both ‘too luxurious’ and not adequate. ‘No milk, sugar or
biscuits, consequently our hopes of a big meal on Xmas day have been
squashed—however we do appreciate what we have.’ In the event, Ronnie’s
Christmas dinner, consisting of a six ounce turkey each, a half-pound pudding
and tea was ‘quite satisfactory’. No stomach aches for his mess but there was a
noticeable downside. ‘Unfortunately the aftermath was no meat for the next 2
days’.
Ronnie Baines, Stalag Luft III, 1942.
Ronnie Baines’ fellow
prisoners may have expressed annual optimism that they would be home by next Christmas, but by the 27th, Ronnie
was in a funk. ‘So another Kriegie Xmas passes, may even have another the rate
the brilliant Allied leaders are charging into battle… Sometimes I wonder if
we’re ever going to be released.’ Missing his wife, Irene, terribly and
bemoaning the ‘miserable’ coal issue, Ronnie’s spirits hadn’t lifted by the end
of the year. ‘Last day of 1944, a year full of big hopes and even bigger
disappointments. New Year’s Eve passed uneventfully, no chirping around at
all.’
Irene and Ronnie Baines’ wedding day, St Marks Church, Alexandria, Egypt, October 1942. Ronnie was captured on 18 November 1942. Courtesy of Stuart Baines.
Alec Arnel, perhaps
feeling less ground down by captivity, had a more optimistic outlook. ‘Soon the
New Year will replace the old. There is no doubt as to what my prayer will be.
I think every soul who has been touched by war’s repulsive hand will cry “Peace!”
Back in Australia, a
young woman was desperately awaiting peace. Evelyn Charles’ sweetheart, Eric
Johnston, had gone missing in action on 23 June 1944. Nothing more was heard
from him. There was only silence. Despite having no idea whether Eric was alive
or dead, she wrote to him on 29 September. ‘It seems years since I have written
to you my darling, but I know that by the time this reaches England you will be
there to collect it, it’s been a long time but good news is coming through
slowly and I am sure that it will be your turn next. … You know dear I am still
holding out great hopes of you being home for Xmas.’ Despite knowing she was ‘a
bit crazy writing these letters when I haven’t any definite news of you
sweetheart’, Evelyn sent another on 2 October because ‘I just know that you are
all right and that by the time these reach their destination you will have
arrived back safely’.
Eric Johnston, 31 WAG course c1942.
It was a terrible time
for Evelyn and, despite her family and work colleagues, she felt alone. So many
others had to bear the same grief of not knowing what had happened to their
menfolk—all the wives and girlfriends and families of prisoners of the
Japanese—and she felt she had no one to share her desperation. Although not
overly religious, she was drawn to Melbourne’s St Paul’s Cathedral for comfort.
‘I used to walk in there and I used to sit in the back of the church. There’s
always people there, no matter what time you went.’ But one day, while she was
sitting quietly, thinking of Eric and hoping he would return safely, her
attention was drawn to a couple sitting further up the aisle. ‘She was breaking
her heart. Absolutely.’ Evelyn didn’t know ‘whether they were mourning someone
or whether they were missing someone. Whether they were like me’, and waiting
for news. She wanted to approach them but ‘I couldn’t—maybe it’s all over for
them and maybe they know—I wish I could talk to them’ but the raw emotion was
too much for Evelyn. ‘I couldn’t stand it. So I got up, I went to work. I had a
hell of a day at work, and do you know, I never, ever went back.’ And she
didn’t talk to anyone about her despair. ‘You did it on your own. You had to.’
St Paul’s Cathedral, Melbourne. Lifted from ‘the web’ but I forgot to save the reference. Sorry.
What Evelyn did not know
was that, after Eric was downed, he had been assisted by the French and then
betrayed. He had been sent to Beauvais, Fresnes and finally to Buchenwald Concentration
Camp. Somehow, the Luftwaffe discovered that 168 allied airmen had been
incarcerated there in appalling conditions. After two months in Buchenwald, the
Luftwaffe secured their transfer and Eric arrived in Stalag Luft III’s East Compound on 20
October 1944. It took a while for details to filter through official channels
and, just before Christmas, Evelyn heard that Eric had been located. But she
didn’t experience elation. ‘I don’t know that I felt anything. I was numb. It
was lovely, he’s a prisoner of war. Fine. But is he still alive? Haven’t heard
from him.’ And she still didn’t hear from him. ‘He didn’t write. They couldn’t
write. I never got any mail from Eric. Not after he was shot down. Oh no,
nothing.’ And then, on 30 May 1945, she received a telegram from Eric.
‘Repatriated to England … Am well and fit fondest love darling.’
Courtesy of Evelyn Johnston.
The war in Europe was
over. The Australian airmen prisoners were liberated. Soon they came home and grand
welcomes were held for them. Melbourne’s on 10 September for homecoming airmen,
including 140 former prisoners of war, was particularly memorable. During a
‘triumphal procession’ the men were treated like celebrities and cheering
crowds rushed the cars. ‘The airmen found themselves shaking hands, being
kissed and patted, and congratulated while girls begged for sprigs of wattle
from the airmen for keepsakes and as the cars moved off again the girls ran
alongside still waving and cheering’.
The Argus (Melbourne),Tuesday 11 September 1945.
The formal reception was
at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and Evelyn was there with Eric’s family. She broke
away from his parents—they weren’t as fast as she was—and ‘ran up an incline to
get up to where … all the boys were’. And then she saw him. And she can still
see Eric, over 70 years later. ‘That was a day I’ll never forget. I can see it
happening. I can relive it—I only have to shut my eyes and I can relive every
second.’ They ran to each other and hugged and hugged, and laughed and cried. ‘There
was quite a lot of family there to welcome him home’, but Evelyn was blind to
them. ‘Don’t ask me who was there—I didn’t see anybody but Eric. … Didn’t see
anybody.’ So intense was her joy at seeing her sweetheart again that ‘I don’t remember
when I got to the point of allowing his Mum and Father to say hallo to him. I don’t.
Really don’t. I must have, or course. I don’t remember.’ All she
remembers is the elation of reunion and ‘the best day of my life’.
The Sun News Pictorial. September 1942. Courtesy of Evelyn Johnston.
A couple of weeks after
Evelyn and Eric’s reunion, Bert Comber, who went straight to North Compound after arriving from Italy, wrote to his niece, Mary, from
Shrewsbury in Shropshire. ‘Just now I
am paying farewell calls to all of the friends I have in this country’ because
he hoped that he would soon be on his way back home. He regretted how much he
had missed both as an operational airmen and a prisoner of war. ‘While I have
been away, your Mummy and Daddy have been sending me pictures of you all and I
have noticed how my four little nieces have grown since I left home—Uncle
Albert has missed so many of your birthdays and so many Christmases too’. But
he hoped that 1944 would be the last Christmas away from his sister Win and her
family, and told little Mary that he ‘will be home for this Christmas, and for
all of them after that’. But on 10 October 1945, when he should have been ‘on
the high seas bound for home’ he wrote to Win to say that ‘the ship I was to go
on has been delayed until about 20 October because of the extensive strikes in
the shipping world over here. At the moment there seems very little prospect of
having these disturbances settled and sometimes I become a little alarmed about
not getting home for Xmas—though it is most unlikely that I shall be delayed
that long’. His departure was then delayed until 27 October. ‘There have been
no departures since 27 September and I am now booked to go on 4 November and to
arrive home about 5 December. We have been promised that all Aussies will be
home before Xmas’. He didn’t really know whether to believe it or not. ‘The
authorities over here have never been able to be really sure however about
plans made ahead—such plans have gone astray so often because of complete uncertainty
and sudden changes in the shipping position. But they are sure, they say, that
things from now on will go according to plan.’
Bert Comber, Stalag Luft III, 1943.
But things didn’t go
quite to plan for Bert. Sometime in October, he met and fell in love with Eve.
They married on 1 November and shortly afterwards, he finally embarked for
Australia, and celebrated Christmas on board the Athol Castle. He arrive in Melbourne on 3
January 1946, followed soon after by Eve.
Once back home, all former prisoners of war—including
the Australian Kriegies of Stalag Luft III—tried to put aside their time as POWs
with varying degrees of success as they embarked on their new, post-war lives.
Alec and Margery Arnel, Wesley Church, 8 October 1945. Courtesy of Alec Arnel.
Charles and Beryl Fry, 22 September 1945, Christ Church of England, Bexley, NSW. Courtesy of Pat Martin.
Eric and Evelyn Johnston, 15 June 1946. Courtesy Evelyn Johnston.
Evelyn and Eric Johnston. Still in love. Taken from the documentary, The Lucky Ones: Allied Airmen and Buchenwald, released in 1994, 50 years after Buchenwald.
I include a link for one of my favourite Christmas carols. It is a newish version of The Little Drummer Boy by my favourite singer and his Christmas guest, David Bowie. It includes a special wish for the peace that Alec Arnel called for, and which all of the men mentioned in this story—and their comrades—fought for.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADbJLo4x-tk
