FIRST PRISONER OF WAR

Press, Volume LXXX, Issue 24369, 22 September 1944, Page 4

FIRST PRISONER OF WAR

NEW ZEALAND OFFICER NOW ON LEAVE (Official News Service.)

LONDON, September 20. Five years and a fortnight ago, on the third day of the war, a Royal Air Force Anson reconnaissance aircraft was flying off the. coast of Heligoland. Another aircraft—a Blohm and Voss seaplane of the German air force, appeared in the sky. The two aeroplanes, now obsolete as operational aircraft, engaged in one of the ’rst aerial combats of the war.

Hindered by gun stoppages, the Anson fought until three of its crew were killed or wounded. Then, riddled with bullets and afire, it plunged into the sea and disintegrated. The unconscious form of its pilot and only survivor floated up from the wreckage, while the German seaplane circled, then landed to pick him up and fly him back to its base.

That was how Flight Lieutenant L. H. Edwards, of Patea, who is now on leave in London, became the first New Zealander and the first British officer taken prisoner by the Germans this .war. Until a few daj ago he had been held in hospitals and prisoner of war camps in Germany and Poland. Flight Lieutenant Edwards said today that he was well treated in the German air force hospital, where he was first taken, but after that began to taste the more normal life of a prisoner of war. In spite of his exceptionally long term in enemy hands, he looks very fit, and is in fine spirits. He puts that down mainly to the outdoor sports and exercise he r.anaged to enjoy nearly everywhere, and which he considers a most important source of both physical fitness and mental alertness In the life of a prisoner of war. ... -