BRITISH PRISONERS IN GERMANY.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXIX, Issue LXIX, 27 May 1915, Page 2

BRITISH PRISONERS IN GERMANY.

Some of the latest phases of life in the internment camp at Ruhleben' are given by Frank Houvenaghel* one of the crew of the Wilson liner Castro. Being a Hollander, he has been permitted to return, after being detained in Germany since mid-July, ajid he has just arrived in Hull. Mr Houvenaghel has a knowledge of German, and said that when the soldiers went round to wake up the sleepers in" the morning they shouted: '"Rouse, you Englisn swine." If a man was tound not to have got up, he was subsequently put into a cell' with a concrete floor, was given only one blanket to wrap himself- in, and was kept there for 72 hours. A number of men were having their constitutions undermined by the bad and insufficient food served out. The British prisoners had been very much heartened by the British relief fund, through which everyone received four marks a week with which to buy clothing if he were in real need. All who got these mark notes signed a paper that they would repay the money to the British Chancellor of the Exohequer when in a position to' do so. The British prisoners, he said, were full of spirit, and refused to believe the news of a disaster to England which was recited to them, on the day before the Kaiser's bir.thday. They -had to rig up a flagstaff, but they cut the halyard, with the result that when the flag was run up the nest day it immediately fell to the ground. The British prisqners thereupon sang their National Anthem, and shouted "Three cheers for England!" but they were punished for it. - .