Digging into the family history treasures again last week, my attention was caught by the Nazi insignia on something among some items a previous generation of family researchers had put into plastic archival sleeves. I'd always known about my Grandmother's brother, Donald Greed, being interned in a German P.O.W. camp, and here were some documents and a couple of letters from him that had been saved.
According to the German document, 23-year old Donald Greed was captured in Libya on 21st of June, 1942 and eventually ended up to the Kreigsgefangenen Manschaftsstammlager (Prisoner of War Main Camp), IV-B. When I started to look up information on the camp, the first bit of trivia I learned is that the familiar term 'Stalag' is actually an abbreviation of Stammlager, which itself is an abbreviation of the longer name above.
The capture date of 21st of June, 1942, marked the Fall of Tobruk, when the Allied Forces surrendered to Rommel, leaving about 33,000 prisoners in the hands of the Germans and Italians. From what I've been reading, the prisoners from Tobruk were all handed over to the Italians to bring back across the Mediterranean to Europe by boat (at least one of which was torpedoed by the British, tragically, sinking it with their own men on board), with many of them remaining in Italian POW camps, while others were sent further north into Germany.
Donald Greed was one of those prisoners who was interred in an Italian POW camp to start with, then the story goes that he escaped, only to be recaptured two weeks later and sent to Germany, to Stalag IV-B. He was damned lucky he wasn't shot. So far, I cannot find out where he was in Italy, but there will be more information on him in the archives.
Stalag IV-B, was located about 45 km north of Dresden, and was one of the largest German POW camps in WWII. Interestingly to me, this was the camp Kurt Vonnegut was brought to when he was captured as well, but he was famously detailed to a work team in Dresden, where he survived the Allied bombing of the city by sheltering in a slaughterhouse. He wrote his brilliant anti-war novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, about his experience.
Back to Uncle Don...
Here are the documents I have. This first one has no writing on it at all. The reverse side is blank. Was it sent home as some kind of proof of him being held captive? It's in immaculate condition, so I don't think it was anything he would have had on him when the camp was liberated by the Russians. His others papers are dog-eared and worn. The answer will be out there somewhere.
This is his 'Personelkarte' with all his details.
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