E&E Report,
Cpl Jack W. SchlegelPage 1 |
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S E C R E T
HQ EUROPEAN THEATRE OF OPERATIONS
P/W and X Detachment
Military Intelligence Service
20 August 1944
E & E REPORT NO.
888 (I.S.9)(WEA)8/3/37
ESCAPE FROM FRANCE |
Jack W. Schlegel,
Cpl, 12190855
508 Para Inf Regt, 82 AB
Division |
MIA 6 June 1944
Arrived in UK
8 August 1944 |
MET OTHER
MEMBERS OF
UNIT |
the objective of my battalion was to secure the
ground to the NW of ETIENVILLE. The 19 of us
in the plane made our jump successfully.
On reaching the ground I discovered that I was
alone, so I started to
walk NE in order to pick up the other members of my
squad. I proceeded
to the NE for about 200 yards and picked up 52
members of my battalion, but
none of them had MG's. They all insisted that
I lead the group as I
spoke German. We walked throughout the night,
in the course of which we
lost 22 men, ending up with 30. The next day
we met Capt. CREARY of the
battalion, joined forces with him, and went on.
Soon we came upon a
German position which we attacked. We had them
about to surrender when
some tanks appeared and forced us to abandon the
attack. |
SURROUNDED
AND CAPTURED
PRISON CAMP
AT STE CHA-
PELL SUR VIRE |
That night we hid out, and the next day we were
trapped in a field
and forced to surrender. We were taken to STE
SAUVEUR LE VICOMTE where
we met 300 other prisoners all from the 82nd and
101st AB Divisions.
There we were loaded into trucks which had no PW
markings on them and
taken in the direction of ST LO. S of ST JEAN
DE DAYE we were strafed
by P-47's. The trucks stopped and the guards
went to the side of the road
from whe4r they covered the trucks with MG's.
However a lot of us
did get out and took cover, suffering heavily from
the strafing and
the German MG fire. I stopped to bandage some
of the prisoners and
then I took off with those unwounded, hiding in the
hedgerows.
My group then head N, and had gone about 8 miles
when I heard my name
called out. The others had followed us with
the guards and had
spotted us, and the colonel wanted me back to
interpret for the
wounded men. The guards then recaptured us and
marched us of to ST LO.
The city was in flames from bombs, so we the the
night on the N side.
The next day we were walked to the prison camp at
ST. CHAPELLE SUR VIE S of ST LO. |
PRISON CONDITIONS |
I arrived there on 9 June and stayed until 28 June.
I was kept
as an interpreter in order to help run the camp for
the Germans and
see that as much as possible was done for the
prisoners. We lived mainly
on soup, sometimes with a little bread and milk.
We had to sleep on
hard floors with one dirty blanket. I was
interrogated briefly - they
asked me my name, rank and serial number and then
had me stand at attention
for six hours when I refused to give the number of
my regiment. The
place was built to accommodate about 600 prisoners,
but there were always
at least 900 there. I know of three escapes
while I was there, all
were caused by hunger, and all three were
unsuccessful. |
TAKEN TO RENNES |
On the evening if 27 June I heard that I was going
to be evacuated
the following day, so I decided to escape. I
crawled through the fence,
but half an hour later was discovered some guards
who returned me
without mentioning to the commandant that I had
escaped. The next day
we started out on foot and walked 48 km and then
stopped for three days.
Then we were taken by truck the rest of the way to
RENNES and put in
the prison camp there, arriving 2 July.
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