ARRIVAL IN ENGLAND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25814, 9 April 1945, Page 6

ARRIVAL IN ENGLAND

AUSTRALIAN PRISONERS OF WAR RELEASED BY AMERICAN DRIVE (Rec. 7 p.m.) LONDON, Apl. 6. The first Australian prisoners of war dramatically liberated from prison camps in Western Germany arrived at the A.I.F. repatriation camp at Eastbourne. -The party, which was made up of fifteen officers and three other ranks, included four former commanding officers of the famous Ninth Division. The camp in which they,were imprisoned was over-run on March 28 by the United States First Army’s armoured drive which broke out of the Remagen bridgehead and swept east and northward to complete the encirclement of the Ruhr.

The Hadamar camp, at which the 18 Australians, all members of the Ninth Division, had been imprisoned since September, 1943, housed 323 Bfitish, South African, Australian, and New Zealand prisoners of war, including one major-general, fifteen diers, and three war correspondents, most of whom were transferred'from Italy. “ When Italy signed the armistice the guards at Bologna threw open the gates,” Major- L. A. Fell, of Bairnsdaie, told the Australian Associated Press. “The Germans the same night carried out a quick operation, rounded the prisoners up, and herded them off to Hadamar.” The Australians described life in Hadamar as monoton,ous in the extreme. Gunfire on the eastern front could be heard for six months before the American breakthrough. Lieutenant-colonel F. R. Marian, of Brisbane, said: “ We were right in the tactical zone. There were Marauders, Lightnings, and Thunderbolts everywhere. They strafed the camp and brought movement on the roads in the daytime to a standstill. Brigadier G. Clifton, of New Zealand, who is now in England, escaped on March 17 during a heavy raid. ’