NAZIS’ RISE AND FALL

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21506, 11 September 1944, Page 4

NAZIS’ RISE AND FALL

N.Z. FLIER’S OBSERVATION FIVE YEARS A CAPTIVE LONDON, Sept. 8. The first British officer taken prisoner in this war has arrived in Sweden after live years in German prison camps. He is Flight Lieutenant Laurence Edwards, Royal Air Force, of Wellington, who is among the 2633 prisoners who arrived at Trelleborg from Germany. Flight Lieutenant Edwards had arrived m England only a few weeks before war broke out. His plane was shot down by a German pilot over Heligoland on September 4, 1939 —the day after Britain declared war on Germany. Two non-commissioned officers from another British plane shot down by the Germans were captured, only a few hours before Flight Lieutenant Edwards. They are still in German prison camps. Flight Lieutenant Edwards said he had seen the Nazi regime rise and fall. At first there had been some uncertainty. This was followed by a period of surpassing arrogance which, in turn, was followed by another period of doubt but no diminution of arrogance. To-day the decline was becoming a debacle and toe spirit had gone out of the Nazis entirely.