Prisoners in 2 tragedies

Press, 14 July 1984, Page 20

Prisoners in 2 tragedies

No Honour No Glory. By Spence Edge with Jim Henderson. Collins, 1984. 191 pp. Illustrations. $19.95. (Reviewed by Jim Donlon)

Most servicemen killed in war die at the hands of the enemy. “No Honour No Glory” is the tragic and compelling story of Kiwi prisoners of war whose deaths resulted from the actions of their friends and comrades. Spence Edge was one of some 2000 Commonwealth prisoners on board the Italian merchantman Jason when it ' was torpedoed on December 9, 1941, off the coast of Greece by the British submarine Porpoise. Of the 500 prisoners killed, 45 were New Zealanders.

Eight months later, on August 17, 1942, a similar fate befell the Nino Bixio, which was sunk by the Royal Navy submarine Turbulent. The ship was carrying about 3000 prisoners of war, of whom 432 died, including 117 New Zealanders. In both cases the ships were unmarked. In both cases, the men of the hour came from the ranks of the “enemy.”

Those who had so far survived among the prisoners could be forgiven for believing that comparative safety lay ahead in the barbed-wire enclosures of the prisoner-of-war camps. Alas, for many, that was not to

be. In one of those awful, unpredictable coincidences that occur in time of war, the greatest threat to their lives came, once again, from their own side — this time in the shape of the bombers of the United States Air Force. On the morning of December 8, 1943, 400 prisoners, including some of the survivors of the torpedo attacks being held at Campo PG 102, in Italy, were marched to the railway station at Aquila to be transported to Germany. At about the same time, the crews of the 340th Medium Bombardment Group were being briefed for the day’s mission — a target that had been on their agenda for some days, but postponed because of bad weather — the marshalling yards at Aquila. Seven of the 10 boxcars were crowded with prisoners when the bombers struck. It was a holocaust, described by one of the attackers as “a scene of beautiful destruction.” Its effectiveness was not in doubt. The yards were in a shambles. According to British record, 81 prisoners died, including eight New Zealanders. The Germans claimed 200 prisoners had died. “No one who saw what happened to our boxcar train is in any doubt that the latter figure is correct," writes the author.