Meeting the Enemy

by Richard van Emden

  British prisoners pose for the camera before beginning their tortuous journey to Germany from the Western Front. In 1914 verbal and even physical attacks on British POWs were common, although as time passed, civilian attention shifted to the chronic shortages of food and fuel in Germany.

  Queuing for food. Red Cross parcels were critical to the physical well-being of internees.

  British internees at Ruhleben camp, near Berlin. Only one camp was used to house all 3,500 male British internees in Germany.

  Living cheek by jowl: British internees had precious little privacy.

  Under an agreement brokered with Germany and Britain, the US ambassador was permitted to visit POW camps. James Gerard, the US ambassador in Berlin, talks to British POWs, although the close proximity of German officers invariably stifled prisoners’ free speech.

  The ringleaders of the Irish Brigade pose for photographs in their new uniforms adapted with Irish insignia. Only around 50 men volunteered to join the Brigade.

  ‘Dear Tommy’: a propaganda leaflet dropped over British lines during the Battle of Loos in October 1915. The bullish tone of the leaflet is in marked contrast to the conciliatory nature of the pamphlets the Germans dropped towards the end of the war.

  A pencil drawing by Private Herbert Gibson of a German notice board placed in no-man’s-land. The German wording on the board, probably inaccurately transcribed by the artist, boasts of German success at Verdun, including the capture of 228 British officers and 17,370 men.

  A remarkable image taken looking out from the German trenches at Beaumont Hamel on the Somme, November 1915. In the distance, around 150 yards away, helmets of British soldiers can be seen looking over the top during a moment of informal fraternisation.

  A day after the terrible British casualties suffered on the first day of the Somme Battle. An unarmed British soldier stands just in front of the German trenches at Beaumont Hamel. Permission to call a truce was forbidden by the Divisional Commander but went ahead regardless, as British soldiers crossed no-man’s-land to collect the wounded.

  In 1916 Captain Robert Campbell wrote to the Kaiser asking for permission to return home to see his dying mother. Permission was granted on condition that he returned to his POW camp in Germany within two weeks. Campbell kept his word.

  April 1916: British and German officers attend the funeral of Captain Wilfred Birt, 9th East Surrey Regiment, at Cologne’s Südfriedhof. Wounded at the Battle of Loos, Birt underwent numerous operations, winning the respect and affection of the German doctors and nurses.

  Souvenirs: two postcards taken from the body of a German soldier. The chilling note on the rear of the card explains the circumstances in which they were obtained.

  After capture, a German soldier cooperates with British soldiers in an attempt to curry favour and lessen the chances of becoming a victim of summary retribution.

  A popular souvenir among British soldiers was the German pickelhaube (helmet). Richard Hawkins in the early 1920s, wearing a pickelhaube that he picked up on the first day of the Battle of the Somme. He is also holding a German Luger pistol.

  IMAGE SECTION 2

  Lieutenant Leo Heywood and, looking away, the observer, 17-year-old Second Lieutenant Douglas Gayforth, are driven away in the back of a Mercedes. Many Royal Flying Corps officers enjoyed a visit to their opponents’ Squadron Mess, frequently staying for dinner and wine. However, such gracious hospitality often came at a price.

  A British BE2c aircraft brought down over German-held ground. The Royal Flying Corps pilot seems unhurt and is talking to a German officer while, behind, a number of Germans look on intently.

  Reading, March 1917: ‘The Kaiser’s Own’ or British soldiers of German heritage await transfer to the Western Front. Eight Infantry Labour Companies (ILCs), of 500 men each, served overseas but behind the lines in the British Army.

  Major William Renwick (centre) with the officers of 3rd ILC. Most of the officers attached to these labour companies were no longer fit for front-line service. Renwick had been shell-shocked in March 1916.

  Winter 1916: as a punishment, a British prisoner is tied to a post and left out in the snow. The photograph was taken on a secret camera owned by a sergeant in the Lincolnshire Regiment at Hesepe POW Camp.

  The British employment of prisoners within twelve kilometres of the firing line caused outrage in Germany. The Germans demanded that prisoners should be no closer than 30 kilometres, a demand ignored by the British.

  British prisoners labouring behind the lines in France. Although none are pictured carrying the artillery shells seen in the foreground, some POWs were employed in moving munitions, against international law.

  A funeral at Doberitz camp presided over by Reverend Henry Williams. In the foreground are men of the Royal Naval Division. Many of these men were sent to work on the Russian Front in February 1917 as a German reprisal for the alleged ill-treatment of prisoners.

  This postcard (the reverse of the picture above) was sent home by Able Seaman Cedric Ireland, who is probably one of the men in the foreground of the photograph. Ireland was sent to Russia where he would die in his comrades’ arms while working in atrocious sub-zero conditions.

  An exceptionally rare photograph showing British POWs at work in the German support trenches on the Russian Front. These men are almost certainly among those sent to Mitau, where dozens died of cold and neglect.

  German guards watch prisoners distribute Red Cross parcels. As the Allied blockade on Germany intensified, such parcels saved POWs from virtual starvation.

  Cassel POW camp, November 1918: the parcel hut with all the records goes up in flames. There was suspicion among some POWs that comrades running the hut were taking items to sell to German guards.

  March 1918: British prisoners remove the personal possessions of dead enemy soldiers killed in the opening days of the German spring offensive. A German soldier makes a note of the items retrieved.

  A Red Cross boat carrying exchanged British POWs sails up the estuary towards Boston Harbour. The crowds on the riverbank cheer the arrival of the men. An hour earlier, the same civilians roundly booed German internees on their way home.

  Dreaming of exchange: this humorous image obscures the fact that many men were suffering severe mental stress or ‘barbed wire disease’ after being cooped up for years.

  Private Bill Easton, seated on the barrel, with his German friend Charley Feldner. Bill agreed to stay on behind enemy lines to help clear the wounded. Given his front-line experience, he was given the honorary rank of Acting Sergeant so that he could give orders to the Germans. On the extreme right stands Sub-Lieutenant Lindemann.

  May 1918: the day after capture, Brigadier General Rees meets the Kaiser behind the Chemin des Dames battlefield. Rees recorded the event in his diary, noting how the Kaiser appeared reflective and downbeat.

  November 1918: an effigy of the Kaiser is strung up in a British street. The public were assured that the Kaiser would be brought to justice but little diplomatic effort was expended in forcing the Dutch to hand over their ‘guest’. He remained in Holland until his death in 1941.

  10 November 1918: the Kaiser quietly slips across the border into Holland. It was 24 hours since the verger of St George’s Church had watched him visit the neighbouring Hohenzollern Museum. As he left, he took a last look at the Church and then walked away into exile.

  The Hohestrasse, Cologne, 1919: British and Empire soldiers walk amongst German civilians. The order not to fraternise was soon ignored by soldiers keen to enjoy the delights of an unspoilt urban metropolis after the devastated battlefields of the Somme and Ypres Salient.

  British infantry pass German soldiers packing up to go home. The ‘pomp and polish order’ given to British troops ensured that Allied troops looked in near-immaculate condition as they crossed into Germany, bringing home to Germans the reality of defeat.

  Tired German soldiers withdrawing through Cologne, cross over the river Rhine. Throughout the city banners exal
ting the courageous efforts of these men were raised by the nervous civilian population and then quickly taken down as Allied troops approached.

  Men of the 23rd Royal Fusiliers pose for a picture with the German family on whom they were billeted. Despite complaints about ruined carpets and cigarette burns, most British soldiers got on remarkably well with the civilian population during the seven-year occupation of Cologne.

  A lifelong friendship. In the 1950s, former artillery driver Alfred Henn and his wife (right) pose with the family of a German soldier with whom he became friends during the occupation. They remained in contact until the late 1990s.

  The author’s grandmother, Margarethe van Emden, née Berndt (centre), studying at Leipzig University around 1924. Behind her stands Ernst Jünger, the highly decorated former German infantry officer and author of Storm of Steel. Margarethe moved to England in the 1930s where she remained for the rest of her life.

  Sources

  Published Memoirs

  Andrews, Albert, Orders are Orders: A Manchester Pal on the Somme, ed. Sue Richardson, privately published, 1987

  Barnett, Denis Oliver, In Happy Memory, privately published, 1915

  Binding, Rudolph, A Fatalist at War, George Allen & Unwin, 1929

  Bloem, Walter, The Advance from Mons, Peter Davies, 1930

  Blücher, Princess Evelyn, An English Wife in Berlin, Constable, 1921

  Buckler, Julius, Malaula! The Battle Cry of Jasta 17, Grub Street, 2007

  Buxton, Andrew, The Rifle Brigade, A Memoir, Robert Scott, 1918

  Byrne, Ginger, I Survived Didn’t I?, ed. Joy Cave, Leo Cooper, 1993

  Chapman, Guy, A Passionate Prodigality, Buchan & Enright, 1985

  Clark, Andrew, Revd, Echoes of the Great War, Oxford University Press, 1985

  Cliff, Norman, To Hell and Back with the Guards, Merlin Books, 1988

  Collins, Norman, Last Man Standing, Pen & Sword, 2002

  Courtney, Lady, War Diary, privately published, 1927

  Crundell, Edward, Fighter Pilot on the Western Front, William Kimber, 1975

  Dundas, Henry, Scots Guards, A Memoir, Blackwood, 1921

  Evans, Alfred, The Escaping Club, John Lane, 1941

  Ewart, Wilfrid, Scots Guard, Strong Oak Press, 2001

  Fielding, Rowland, War Letters to a Wife, Spellmount Classics, 2001

  Foley, G. A., On Active Service, privately published, Bridgewater, 1920

  Gerard, James W., My Four Years in Germany, Hodder & Stoughton, 1917

  Gillespie, Alexander, Letters from Flanders, Smith, Elder & Co, 1916

  Graham, Stephen, A Private in the Guards, William Heinemann, 1928

  Grinnell-Milne, Duncan, An Escaper’s Log, John Lane, 1926

  Hitchcock, Frank, ‘Stand To’ A Diary of the Trenches, Hurst & Blackett, 1937

  Hodges, Frederick James, Men of 18 in 1918, Arthur H. Stockwell Ltd, 1988

  Hutchison, Graham Seton, Footslogger, Hutchinson & Co., 1933

  Jünger, Ernst, Storm of Steel, Allen Lane, 2003

  Lucy, John, There’s a Devil in the Drum, The Naval and Military Press, 1993

  Markham, Violet, A Woman’s Watch on the Rhine, Hodder & Stoughton, 1921

  Martin, Jack, The Secret War Diary of Jack Martin, Bloomsbury, 2009

  McCudden, James, Flying Fury: Five Years in the Royal Flying Corps, The Aeroplane Publishing 1918

  Muddock, J. E. Preston, All Clear, A Brief Record of the London Special Constabulary 1914-19, Everett & Co., 1920

  Osburn, Arthur, Unwilling Passenger, Faber & Faber, 1926

  Peel, Mrs C., How We Lived Then, The Bodley Head, 1929

  Pickard-Cambridge, Hilda, An Englishwoman’s Experiences in Germany, August 1914, privately published, 1931

  Richard, Frank, Old Soldiers Never Die, Faber & Faber, 1942

  Roddie, Stewart, Peace Patrol, Christophers, 1932

  Siepmann, Harry, Echo of the Guns, Robert Hale, 1987

  Stoffa, Pal, Round the World to Freedom, John Lane, 1933

  Troyte-Bullock, C. J., in History of the Somerset Light Infantry 1914-1919, Everard Wyrall, Methuen & Co, 1927

  Vischer, A. L., Barbed Wire Disease, John Bale & Co., 1919

  Vivian, A. P. G., The Phantom Brigade, Ernest Benn, 1930

  Walkinton, M. L., Twice in a Lifetime, Samson Books, 1980

  Unpublished Memoirs

  Cole, Vic, Lance Corporal, 7th Royal West Kent Regiment, An Englishman’s Life

  Parke, C. G. A., 2nd Gordon Highlanders, Memories of an Old Contemptible

  Smith, Francis Nimmo, 1st Scots Guards, Diary

  Newspapers

  Bournemouth Guardian 11 January 1916: reported court appearance of Julia Jacobitz

  East London Observer 8 August 1914: editorial on East London Germans

  Manchester Guardian 10 August 1914: Aliens’ Restriction Act; 26 September 1914: letter from Charles Eshborn

  The Times online 27 June 1904: King George’s visit to Kiel; 6 August 1914: Florence Phillips; 8 August 1914: Bampfylde Fuller; 26 December 1914: Hensley Henson; 26 December 1914: Reverend Henry Woods; 12 May 1915: Sir Felix Semon, Sir Carl Meyer and Leopold Hirsch; 7 July 1916: Jellicoe’s Despatch; 8 March 1918: Lord Newton’s speech to the House of Lords; 12 July 1918: Sir George Cave and Brigadier Page Croft; 2 November 1918: Udo Willmore-Wittner

  Magazines

  Account of Private Robert Nisbet, published in The New Chequers, magazine of the Friends of Lochnagar

  Memoirs of Corporal Walter Crookes, 1st Cheshire Regiment, published in the Regimental magazine The Oak Leaf, date unknown

  Memories of Lieutenant Alexander Gallaher and Private Alfred Tilney, published in the Regimental Magazine of the 4/7th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards

  Memories of Private William Gordon, published in The Beam, December 1969

  Other Reading

  Brown, Malcolm & Seaton, Shirley, Christmas Truce, Papermac, 1994

  Holmes, Richard, Tommy: The British Soldier on the Western Front 1914 - 1918, Harper Collins, 2004

  Housman, Laurence, War Letters of Fallen Englishmen, Victor Gollancz, 1930 (incl. letters of Captain Edward Hulse and Lt Colonel John Hawksley)

  Marlow, Joyce, Women and the Great War, Virago, 1998

  Panayi, Panikos, The Enemy in our Midst, Berg, 1991

  van Emden, Richard, All Quiet on the Home Front, Headline, 2003

  van Emden, Richard, The Soldier’s War, Bloomsbury, 2008

  W. A. S. and J. D. N., eds, Wycliffe and the War 1914–1918, including letters of Melville Hastings, privately printed, 1923

  Willis, James F., Prologue to Nuremberg, Greenwood Press, 1982

  Winter, John, Death’s Men, Allen Lane, 1978

  Archives

  Author’s private collection: Letters of Rifleman Ernest Blake; photocopied diary of Private Tom Tolson, 8th King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry

  Hansard: Reginald McKenna and Joseph King (HC Debate 5/8/1914 vol. 65 c1987-90); Winston Churchill (HC Debate 15/4/1919 vol. 114 cc2713-4); Edward Shortt (18/2/1919 vol. 112 cc741-3 and HC Debate 13/3/1919 vol. 112 cc260 and 01/04/1919 vol. 114 cc1054-5 and HC Debate 15/7/1919 vol. 118 cc210-11); Caroline Hanemann (HC Debate 7/8/1919 vol. 119 cc527-8)

  Imperial War Museum: By kind permission of the Department of Documents, with grateful thanks to Tony Richards: private papers of Captain Charles Carrington – Documents 20614; private papers of Major General Sir Richard Ewart – Documents 683; account by an English Woman (Miss Waring) of the Outbreak of War in Germany, August 1914 - Documents 12426; private papers of EV Stibbe – Documents 11786; private papers of Lieutenant Thomas Hughes – Documents 12244; private papers of Richard Noschke – Documents 11229; jingoistic letter from Lotte to Dorothy September 1914 – Documents 1962; private papers of Lieutenant Colonel Sir Iain Colquhoun – Documents 6373; private papers of Brigadier General H. C. Hubert Rees – Documents 7166; Royal Dragoons Letter Book, 1914 – Documents 12546; private papers of Miss W. L. B. Tower incl. reference to 3rd Marquess of Ormonde –
Documents 6322; private papers of Private Martyn Evans – Documents 9766; letter from a German soldier (Wiengartner) to the family of a wounded British soldier (Mole), March 1916 – Documents 12451; private papers of Private Samuel Fielding – Documents 12810; private papers of Major General Sir John Laurie – Documents 1713; private papers of Reverend Montague Bere – Documents 12105; private papers of Brigadier T. I. Dun – Documents 12179; private papers of Private Frank Harris – Documents 14979; private papers of Brigadier Philip Mortimer – Documents 12327; private papers of Private Percy Clare – Documents 15030; private papers of Private Arthur Wrench – Documents 3834; private papers of Captain Arthur Pick – Documents 4672; private papers of H. G. R. Williams – Documents 11514

  By kind permission of the Department of Sound, Imperial War Museum, and with thanks to Peter Hart: Lance Corporal Harry Hopthrow – Catalogue Number 11581. Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders and the author and the Imperial War Museum would be grateful for any information which might help to trace those whose identities or addresses are not currently known.