FORCED SALUTE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20570, 2 June 1941, Page 5

FORCED SALUTE

HOSPITAL PATIENTS THREAT WITH GRENADES (Reed. June 2, 9 a.m.) CAIRO, May 31. A New Zealander who was wounded in Crete, interviewed, said: “I was in a tent hospital camp on May 20 when 50 planes bombed and machinegunned us for 90 minutes. Parachutists followed the Stukas and captured the camp. “They ordered us out at the point Of tommy guns, whether we were able to walk or not. They threw hand grenades into the tents to hurry us They replaced the Union Jack with a Swastika and ordered the patients to stand with their arms raised in the salute for half an hour. Many collapsed. A German officer intervened and ordered the patients to bed, but a superior officer swaggered up, cursing and threatening us with grenades. Another officer took photographs of us. A New Zealand battalion 400 yards away eventually recaptured the hospital. The Germans tried to escape, making lb wounded march ahead of them. A v-v-nded parachutist who was being treated in the hospital exactly as the British volunteered to be a guard when the Germans captured it and proved one of the most brutal.”