MILITARY DRAMA

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 121, 24 May 1945, Page 8

MILITARY DRAMA

SURRENDER OF GERMANS

END OF THE HIGH COMMAND (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.) Rec. 1.50 p.m. LONDON, May 23.

Describing the arrest of the Nazi officials, a correspondent says that in accordance with a prearranged plan, Doenitz, Jodl, and Friedeburg boarded the SHAEF mission ship Patria, a former Hamburg-Arnerika liner, which is moored off the High Command buildings. Th° American General Lowell Rooks, accompanied by a British brigadier and a Russian major-general, met the party in the ship's bar and told Doenitz curtly that his Government had come to an end and that the High Command were under arrest. They asked him if he had anything to say. Doenitz replied stiffly, "Any words would be superfluous." General Rooks informed them that they would be taken under guard to pack and have lunch before leaving by air for the place of imprisonment. Meanwhile, on receipt of a code word, battalions of the Cheshire, Herefordshire, and Hussar Regiments, prepared for aIJ emergencies, moved into the German-controlled area with tanks and Bren gun carriers. The British soldiers entered the German High Command's brick building, where •officers, secretaries, and civilians stood facing the walls with their hands over their heads, guarded by bayonets. Squads of expert searchers removed wireless sets, secret documents, and personal belongings into vans, while special men accompanied Jodl to his office to collect wanted folders. IN THEIR UNDERCLOTHES. The Germans had apparently slept late, as a number of high-ranking officers were still in their underclothes. They were not allowed to dress before being marched outside to await identification. Jodl, having handed over the required documents, stepped haughtily down eight stairs to the courtyard in full general's dress. He looked scornfully at a barrage of cameras and correspondents, and saluted his hatless and dishevelled staff, lined up outside, before entering a waiting car. British military police rounded up Speer in the fifteenth-century moated castle which was the home ■ of the Doenitz Government. Friedeburg took his last salute when a party of arrested marines marching down ihe road still singing "We March Against England" saw him in a car outside the headquarters. They stopped and gave a military salute, which Friedeburg punctiliously returned. Fifteen minutes later he asked permission to visit the lavatory. The guards consented, but on hearing the door being locked, broke it down with their rifle butts, only to find Eriedeburg unconscious with a tin of poison by his side. He died within a minute. After Friedeburg's suicide, Doenitz, Jodl, and Speer were taken to the British headquarters in the centre of the town. They arrived unheralded and | unwatched except by a crowd of ragged urchins trailing bunches of firewood. Sentries stood at attention as the captives entered. Doenitz, wearing an admiral's full-dress uniform, carried his baton. PRESS INTERVIEW. An hour later correspondents were interviewing Doenitz, Jodl, and Speer. They asked: "Can you tell us where Himmler is?" Doenitz retorted: "I won't say a single word."' The correspondents then asked Jodl, who drew himself up to his full height, and said: "I am a prisoner and I am obliged to give nothing except my name and rank." "And what is it?" was the last, question. "I am Oberst-Colonel Alfred Jodl, Chief of Staff of the WehrroachV came the uncompromising reply. The Germans refused to reply to further questions. ■ The prisoners taken in today s roundup totalled several thousands, including generals, admirals, and civilians forming Doenitz's so-called Government. ____™»»~—.