WAR-TIME LIFE IN BREMEN

Evening Star, Issue 23861, 16 April 1941, Page 8

WAR-TIME LIFE IN BREMEN

NIGHTLY FEAR OF RAIDERS " BETTER BEFORE HITLER " Sailors of many nations have collected during the past few weeks at the Seamen’s Home in Stockholm, and it was here I met a Dane who had spent the last few months either at Bremen or in German ships (writes a correspondent of ‘ The Times ’). Now that good fortune had brought him into a Swedish port he had “jumped his ship ” and swore he would never sail with the Germans again. He did not like the food—potatoes nearly all the time, with seldom a hit of the meat Danes were used to. The men at sea also had bread enough, and not of bad quality, but that was practically all that an ordinary German sailor’s diet consisted of when his ship was in German waters. The Danish seaman had spent more time at Bremen than anywhere else. While lying at anchor in Bremenhaven he saw 'the liner Bremen bombed. She was taken to Hamburg, where he saw. her again later. There was bombing almost every night, but not on Saturdays. Every Saturday the people of Bremen rejoiced, for they_ felt sura they would have a good night’s rest* There was no hate for the Britisht among the people he knew They never use the word “ Englander * now, but call all British men “ Tommies ” and all British aeroplanes ‘Canadian Cowboys.” “ They don’t like them Canadian Cowboys, said the Danish sailor, in his fluent English. BROADCASTS FROM ENGLAND. He was friendly with a German firemap working at a Bremen factory, and when off duty went nearly every night to his home to listen to the 8.8. C. English and German broadcasts. The fireman and his wife did not like Germany, and most of the people at the factory did not like Hitler, It was better before, they said. The Dane and his friend often went to a Bremen cinema, where only German films are shown, but they never saw a whole picture, as the performance was always interrupted by an air raid whenever he went, and they had to go down into the shelters. This was compulsory. Once he was stopped in. the street during a raid and had his name taken down, but nothing came of it. Everything, even the beerhouses,' closed as soon as the sirens sounded. It was cold down in the_ shelters* Some better ones were being built, and one in Hamburg, above ground, looked like a big water tower going up to a peak. Bremen was “ pretty badly ■ bombed, including the waterworks, the docks, and some aeroplane works. Everybody said that the damage done on one night was over 1,000,000 m, and all the people there were nervous. He was not in Hamburg so much, and did not see a great deal, of the damage there, “ but then, the. port of Hamburg is very big, and you can’ll go just where you like.” PRISONERS’ HARDSHIPS. Nearly all the labourers in the Bremen docks were prisoners of war, mostly French, although there were many’ Poles, too, as well as some Belgian and' Dutch, who might have been volunteers. He saw no British nrisoners. They were very strict with the Poles, who had a much harder time than the French. The rations were very bad and insufficient. “ Thev would come and beg food,” he added, “ and though this was not allowed we gave them bits, as well as the remains of our potato mash, which we could not eat but which they thought was good. The guards did not pay much attention; they were not very strict with the French. “When they were not at work.the prisoners of war lived on German ships anchored in Bremerhaven. They were not allowed out of the harbour. There seemed to be a couple of thousand working there sometimes. They complained about food, hut most of all because they had no soap; thcre_ was none at all on the ships, they said. “There were a lot of Poles in ■civilian clothes working in Bremen, but they were not allowed out of tha docks. You knew they were Poles immediately, as they all wore a large ‘ P ” on their left breasts.”