Cont.

(Interviewer – So how did they execute the lady and) The following day. (Interviewer – And you say you had to watch it?) Yes. They took them out in a compound out back. This was an exercise area and they had these little cubicles. They had a wall, wall and wall (showed with hands). And then the prison itself, they had a catwalk around there where a guy could walk around, the guard could walk around on it. And that was exercise guards. They were suppose to, I never got out to one of them, but they made us go stand on that catwalk and watch them machine gun those two. (Interviewer – Did they blindfold them?) No. They just chased them out into there and let them have it. (Note: He could not tell from the distance whether it was actually the man and woman from the group that he was with.) (Interviewer – Did you ever think that would happen to you?) We were standing there in the cell one day and this guard came, he opened up the door, walked in and he said “Come to tell you, you are to be shot.” You know as I look back on it, what in the hell was I thinking about, these people, they could shoot us anytime. Who was around to stop them? Yet I didn’t panic or anything else. All I did was turn to this guy and asked “Do you think we could get a Priest?” And then he said “I just, I just.” It took me a while for that to sink in. Finally the guy says he’s kidding. Some joke. Of course, obviously it didn’t happen. (Note: He said that the interrogator in Fresnes said he was an American from New Jersey and that he left there and went to Germany to join the Gestapo. He had his own office. He had a “Louisville Slugger” bat and used it during the interrogations. He got a broken clavicle from it. He said the man did not have an accent. No uniform, just street clothes and he would recognize him for sure. When he told the US Intelligence about the man when he was interviewed, he felt they knew about him. Once a Luftwaffe medical type man came to his cell and put black salve on a boil he had on his shoulder. He said he ate cabbage soup there, worms included. You got use to it. He said once he got some cheese and jam, from the Red Cross in France he was told. He said that one time there was bombing close enough to hear and aircraft flying. He got into trouble trying to see out of a corner of a small obscured window in the cell that he broke. He said he was taken way down inside the prison and put in a cell. The cell was dark and damp, no light. While in there he was only given rotten cabbage to eat and no water. The walls were covered with moths and very damp. He said he “patted” the moths and had to lick the walls to get liquid. He was in this cell , he is guessing for about 30 days.
A Luftwaffe Officer came to the cell one time and spoke to him while Russell was there. He did not know the ranking of the German Officer’s at the time. He said it was a bluish-gray uniform with silver epilates, woven cord. He was a big guy and spoke very good English. The Luftwaffe Officer asked him if he was a military man. He said yes RAF. The Luftwaffe Officer said “You shouldn’t be here. We will see about this.” They talked about the war a bit. He told the Officer “You can’t possibly win the war, you have the whole world against you.” He said the Officer looked around and leaned in close and said “Well yes, thinking people in Germany think that way also. You and I are little people, we can’t make these decisions.” Two or three days later, he left the prison.)
(Interviewer – Did you ever get shot?) (Note: In Stalag IVB) This guard walked up to me. I had a cigarette in my mouth and he flipped it out of my mouth. When I reached over to pick up the cigarette, he shot me in the hand. Just plain cussedness. Well they took me over to the Lazerette, what they called the little dispenser we had there. And this Russian Doctor fixed me up. He did a good job. I still have the nerve coming down here, splits right about here (points) and part of it goes on the inside of this finger and part on the inside of this finger. And that’s what is severed. That nerve. Just upstream of the split. So I have no feeling inside of that finger and inside of that finger. Now I have it on the outside of those two fingers because that’s the next nerve over. So that’s still there. This guy did a good job. (Interviewer – Did the bullet go completely through?) Yes, it went through, the jacket, the copper nickel jacket on the round tore loose and that lodged in my hand. It passed these two fingers and broke the bones in those fingers and there’s a lump there now. It didn’t quite set the way they should. (Interviewer – Was it a pistol the guy shot you with?) Yes a Walther 7.65.
(Interviewer – How long in that prison in Paris?) 14 weeks. (Interviewer – And then what?) Well I was sitting there in the cell one day and they moved me from where these other 3 people were into another cell where there was only one fellow, a man by the name of Russell. He was a B-17 Pilot that had been knocked down over Ploeron, in southern France. He came from Texas. (Note: Lt. Colonel James “Jim” Russell Jr., (His first name is Colonel, a family name passed down.) was shot down on May 29th, 1943 over Ploeren, France. He flew in the B-17 named “Concho Clipper.” He left Fresnes and arrived in Stalag Luft 3 sometime in November. He arrived in very bad shape. He was repatriated on the Red Cross ship Gripsholm.) We were sitting there one day and this Luftwaffe Officer arrived. He was talking with us. He said, “You shouldn’t be here.” I think I agreed with that. He said “You should be Prisoners of War in Germany.” About 3 days later, they moved us out. They moved me to a Dulag Luft, which was in a little town called Oberusel, just outside of Frankfurt. That was an interrogation camp. That was the only Luftwaffe camp that I was ever in. (Interviewer – Did they take you by train?) Yes, nice coaches, travelling first class from Paris to Frankfurt! We got there just the day after the Schweinfurt Raid. When the Americans met 1100 fighters and they lost about 60 air craft that day. All these Americans. They had us. They would march us down the street, around a corner and march us back through the same place. And of course that was to impress the Germans. They thought they were different people. And we would go by the same point several times and of course each time, “Look at all the people that were captured.” They did capture a bundle of those B-17’s. We went to this Oberusel, this town. There was a gas house, a bar, like a little hotel there and they had card tables set up in the front yard and they interrogated us there. Well I was in civilian clothes. (Interviewer – Is that a problem? Did that make it rougher because you were not in uniform?) Well they said, “You say you are an American. You say you were in the Canadian Luftwaffe. You say you fly with the English Luftwaffe.” They couldn’t even get British. “You are not American. You are not Canadian. You are not English. You are French!” I said, “How do you get that?” They said, “We heard you speaking French through the ventilator. Well ok, you get a Frenchman in here and I’ll speak about 3 words of French and he’ll know that I am no Frenchman. Well they couldn’t figure this out. They just, I don’t think they ever did down to the end. An American in somebody else’s service and flying with a third outfit. They just couldn’t figure any of this out. This fellow he, (Interviewer – If you’re not in uniform can’t they treat you as a spy?) That’s the general idea. That’s actually not what the Geneva Convention says. What it says is you must be able to readily identify yourself as a military member. And that is some piece of your uniform, possibly a dog tag, identification. But of course, conversely, if they wanted to shoot, who is to stop them. (Interviewer – Did you have anything like that? Did you have your dog tags with you?) I had my dog tags, yes my British dog tags. They were round wafer and one of them was red and the other one was black. The red one was acid proof and the black one was fire proof. And of course we wore both of them. Theoretically, if we got battery acid on us, well the other one would suffice. But that was the system they used. (Interviewer – But you showed these to the Germans?) Yes, Oh yes. I lost those when I got out. When I finally got away. I had this little Italian Army muzette bag and I had a half a dozen little odds and ends in there. And I lost the bag. I was crawling down through this ditch and I had the thing strung around my neck and all of a sudden it wasn’t there. I don’t know where.