NAZI LABOUR CAMPS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21956, 13 November 1934, Page 12

NAZI LABOUR CAMPS

DIGGING AND DISCIPLINE A NEW ZEALAND RECRUIT RHODES SCHOLAR AT WORK BY G. S. COX (Copyright.) No. I. This summer 1 set out to see something of the now Germany which the Nazis have been busy erecting since they came to power twenty months ago. I speak German, so I applied to the German authorities for permission, as a student with an interest in their country, to work in one of tho camps of the Youth Labour Service, the Freiwilligo Arbeitsdienst. They examined my credentials, made me submit a statement of my paßt career, and linally allotted me to a camp in a little village eallod Rodewald, about twenty miles from Hanover.

There are over 1000 of these camps— Arbeitslager—in Germany. Thoy exist partly to provide work for the young unemployed and partly as -places where the youth of the country in general may b© put through a training in manual labour under conditions of military organisation and military discipline. The service is in name voluntary—Froiwillige—except for students, who must do six months' labour training before they can enter tho university; in practice it is compulsory for others as well. Any young unemployed who refused to serve in a labour camp wouid lose the dole. Moreover, under the Labour Law of August, 1934, every employer, in granting employment, is required to give preference to applicants with a work pass—Arbeitspass—showing that they have served the required period in the Labour Service. The Government intends, as soon as funds permit, to make a year's training in a labour camp compulsory for every young German between the ages of 17 and 25, in the way in which military training was compulsory in pre-war days. I had heard rumours of inadequate food and bad conditions so 1 prepared myself by buying a big red sausage and stowing it in my kit. In the Camp The camp proved to be a group of low-roofed wooden barracks, painted red and white, and grouped round a sandy parade square. In front were three flagstaffs, flying the red, white and black of Germany, the Nazi swastika flag, and the Labour Service banner—red, with, in the white centre circle, the emblem of a spade between two ears of wheat. By the gateway stood a sentry in 'khaki, with a spade sloped on his shoulder. I was allotted to an ordinary section, and served for three weeks under the same conditions and the same discipline as the other trainees. They were mostly young workers and unemployed from Hanover and the R,uhr, with a scattering of students. There are some camps run specially for students, but this was ail Ordinary camp typical in routine and organisation of hundreds in the service.

Wo slept sixteen to a barrack, each man having his own bunk and locker. I was issued with the snmo equipment as the others. It included everything necessary for camp life, including sports clothes, sports shoes, underclothes and sdx. For work wo wore a drab uniform of field grey, in which we looked like German prisoners in tho war-time photographs. For parades, and to go on leave, we had a smart khaki uniform, with a swastika armband like that of the Storm Troops, black shoulder tabs, and a peaked, high-crowned cap. One Ihrge room, with trestle tables and an old piano, served as a dining room and living mom. Photos of Hitler, Goering, the "German Saar" and Hindenburg looked down from their place on the walls amidst Nazi flags. There were slogans, too, such as "Labour Service is tho Honour Service of German Youth," and "Germany needs you as you heed Germany." One camp I vigited near Berlin had a framed quotation from a speech by Hitler, "The .Tew is not a German, but merely a trader; not a citizen, but an exterminator." But there were touches relieving this propaganda—here a bunch of flowers, there some heather. The Bay's Routine

The camp day began at 5 a.m., when the notes of the chill German reveille called us out to ten minutes' early physical exercises. After washing, dressing and bed-making, came, at 5.45, breakfast of coffee, bread, margarine and jam. The food was very plain, but good, and we could eat as much as we wished. I felt a little ashamed of that sausage. After breakfast came flag parade, and then tho work sections inarched off, flag in front. As we went along the country roads wo sang sometimos Nazi anthems and Labour Service songs; but more often we sang popular tunes such as "In Hamburg Lives My Blonde." The work went on from 7 a.m. until 1 p.m., with a break of about half an hour at - 9.30 for a second breakfast of bread, sausage and cheese. There was no slave driving. When the foreman was on another part of tho location it was always possible to take a spell in the sun, or hunt snakes in the heather. It was all straightforward manual work, digging ditches or cutting undergrowth'for ditch bottoms, in order to drain the sour heather land and make it fit for cultivation

The camp authorities denied vigorously that the work was being made solely in order to give these young unemployed something to do. They argued that it was pnrt of a scheme to make Germany independent of foreign foodstuffs in the event of war or'a breakdown of the credit system. But if the work was important, it was certainly not urgent. The men felt the work monotonous, and did no more than was necessary. Fourpence a Day x

At 1 p.m. we marched home to a lunch which consisted usually of a big bowl of stew. Then came an hour and a-half's rest, "Bettruhe," and at 4.30, two hours' drill or sport. Supper was at 6.30, and consisted of coffee, bread and sausage. The evenings were free, or used for singing, lectures, or listening to political speeches on the radio. Lights out came at 10 p.m. It was not a very hard day once one was fit. As wages the trainee received his keep, the use of the issued clothing, and 25 pfennings a day—about 4d at the present rate of exchange. Out of this he had to buy boot polish and soap before he had anything left for extras like tobacco. Leave was, however, plentiful. Those who could afford it could return to their homes in Hanover at the week-end.

These conditions were a little better,, according to trainees who had served in other parts of the country, than in most camps. But the difference lay in the fact that we had a better leader than most camps, and not in any difference in routine or equipment. Our commander was an ex-wartime Army officer, strict, but popular.