Whilst researching material for another blog post I came across a newspaper article about Corporal John Dennis, Royal Army Service Corps. This article tells the story of how he managed to evade detection by the German authorities for the entire five years of the occupation of the Channel Islands.
His reason for appearing in this article was because he had been invited back to Ramsgate, where he had been previously based in 1940, after returning from Dunkirk. Dennis was bringing a message of thanks for the Red Cross parcels that were received by Channel Islanders.1
Dennis was at home in Guernsey, on leave, when the Germans arrived. I have previously written about visitors that found themselves caught up in the occupation of the Channel Islands, but not military personnel. You can find that blog post here.
There were other military personnel home on leave who were caught up in the capture of the islands and they were taken prisoner and held at Castle Cornet before being sent to P.O.W. Camps in Germany.
Dennis had other ideas. When the enemy arrived he burnt his battledress and wore civilian clothes. He appeared on the “other ranks casualty list” in September 1940 as missing.
WO417/18 Casualty Lists (Other Ranks) 304-322 page 20 held at the National Archives.
By 1941 he appeared on a list of the missing circulated around POW Camps to try and locate missing personnel.
I was intrigued by the newspaper article as I had never heard of anyone doing this, and had not heard of John Dennis. Having asked around it seemed that nobody else had heard of this story either, apart from one possible post war lead that turned out to be a dead end.
I checked the many books and publications that I have and still turned up nothing, other than a Private who presented himself at the Royal Hotel to meet with Lieutenant-Colonel Stoneman of Force 135 on 9 May 1945. That was Private Le Goupillot, who had initially been detained by the Germans for eleven weeks in 1940, before being released back into the civilian population due to ill health.2
One of the regular readers of the blog is Alan Dennis so, although a long shot, I asked him if by any chance John Dennis was a relative. It turned out he wasn’t a relative but Alan had been told about Dennis by his Grandmother. His Grandmother had lived near where John Dennis lived during a large part of the occupation.
This spurred me on to find out more, armed only with the newspaper article this wasn’t going to be easy. My next port of call were the ever helpful staff at the Island Archives to see if they knew anything of Corporal Dennis. They didn’t know of a Corporal Dennis but they did have a registration form for a John Dennis.
They pulled out the documents for me and I went along to see what leads they would give me. Having looked at his registration documents I noted that he had a wife Adèle Dennis with whom he seems to have lived for part of the occupation. Having found her registration form in the same folder I was able to ascertain that, whilst she now had British nationality, she was originally from Austria.
John Dennis shown from the picture on his registration form held at the Island Archives.
The documents held at the archives reveal that he moved around a lot during the early part of the Occupation, although remaining in St Peter Port. Living at Truchot House, Le Truchot, then 29 Havelet, 29 Hauteville, 4 Sir William Place and then 3 Vauvert Terrace.
After this he was looked after by a Scotswoman for the remainder of the occupation and lived in Mount Durand. Initially at 1 Mount Durand from July 1943 then at 2 Mount Durand from 28 December 1943. Curiously in the article in the newspaper he says that the he was looked after by a Scottish lady for the whole five years.
For five years I was cared for by a Scotswoman at Mount Durand, Guernsey, and had it not been for her great help I probably could not have fooled the Nazis.
Cpl. John Dennis – Interview with the Thanet Advertiser & Echo, Tuesday 12 June 1945
One thing that nobody picked up on, or if they did they didn’t act on it, was that on his registration form he had entered the date of leaving the British Army as 8 July 1940, some 8 days after the Germans had occupied Guernsey.
Extract from John Dennis’s registration form from 1940. Held at the Island Archives.
At various points throughout the occupation the Germans were convinced that there were British soldiers hiding here, particularly after commando raids. They were successful in rounding up all that didn’t escape after the raids. Dennis and those that helped him were putting themselves at great risk. They risked being deported to camps in mainland Europe or worse shot.
His updated registration form dated 22 December 1942 lists him as judicially separated from his wife and and working as a lorry driver for for a German firm Ruby. You may be wondering why he is working for a German firm. Frankly those that lived in the Channel Islands had little choice as if they refused they would imprisoned, not be able to obtain food or escape the island. Unlike France they couldn’t disappear from the area.
The form had a number of slips attached to it updating details of where he worked and lived. From October 1943 until February 1944 he worked as a labourer for the German Forces. After this he became a docker working for Blum & Co until November 1944 when he returned to being a labourer.
The report in the Thanet Advertiser & Echo records that he told their reporter “a harrowing story of the misery he had seen, and experienced himself, and some of the details of the Germans’ behaviour are so revolting that they are unprintable”.
The remainder of the article tells of the hardships faced by the civilian population. He talks about the difficulties in obtaining food and that the Red Cross ship Vega delivering food saved many from starvation. I wrote about that in a blog post here.
I also found a small article which recorded him talking about the cost of obtaining rabbits and chickens on the black market being £20. That is the equivalent of £1,105 at the time of writing this in May 2023.
As well as shortages of everyday items medicines had all but run out. As a result of this he reports having had twenty two teeth extracted without anaesthetic.
He appears again on the casualty lists from July to August 1945 as reported not missing.
WO417/95 Casualty Lists (Other Ranks) 24 July 1945 to 14 August 1945 page 6 held at the National Archives.
The article finishes by providing the address that he was staying at and inviting those Channel Islanders in England seeking news of relatives to contact him.
So what else do we know about Corporal Dennis? Sadly the answer to that is not a lot. If you are reading this and are by any chance related to him or know something about his time in Guernsey or the Scottish lady that helped him I would love to know more.
Massive thanks to the following people for their assistance with locating information on Corporal Dennis.
Alan Dennis for passing on the story that his grandmother had told him about this gentleman which spurred me on to keep looking.
The team at Island Archives for searching their records to see what they could find on anyone called John Dennis. This enabled me to find more about who he was, where he lived, and what he did.
Pierre Renier for tracking down the service number of Dennis and that he had appeared in a casualty list as missing and then a later list as no longer missing. This helped me to track down some more information.
I hope that you have enjoyed reading the blog post.
I also co-host a podcast with Keith Pengelley in which we talk about the occupation of the Channel Islands month by month using first hand accounts, diaries and our research in the archives. You can find us on all the major podcast services. Just search “Islands at War” or visit our podcast page here.
You can also follow the blog on Twitter at @Fortress_Island where I share other information and photographs. If you prefer Facebook I also have a page there.
If you would like to receive email notifications of future blogs, you can sign up to the right of this blog post or here. Feel free to look around the website, where I have categorised posts to make them easier to find and other resources such as tours, places to visit and films that may be of interest.
You can also find articles, podcasts, TV appearances and other social media etc here.
I will be adding more as time permits. Thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope you enjoyed it. Please share it on social media or add a comment if you did. Feedback is always appreciated.
Also happy to be contacted with questions about the war in the Channel Islands, media appearances, podcasts etc.
Lord Portsea was a colourful character and frankly must have been viewed by the British Government as a bit of a nuisance. The octogenarian was a fervent champion of the plight of the Channel Islands population, those that had been evacuated, those that were serving in the armed forces and those that remained behind in the Channel Islands. Despite this I would venture to suggest that many Channel Islanders alive now would be unaware of what he achieved and how he helped the islands.
If you are old enough to remember Monty Python’s “Life of Brian” then you will understand that this is a bit of a “What did Lord Portsea ever do for us apart from….” rather than the Romans. If you don’t remember Monty Python this is the relevant bit!
Some might say that he did more for the Channel Islands than any member of the House of Lords since the end of the war. There were others in the Lords that raised the issue of the Channel Islands from time to time but none were as vociferous and persistent as Portsea.
Some of the suggestions of action that he called on the government to take were quite sensible and others a little more fanciful. His suggestions included using POWs to sail a ship with aid to Guernsey or some women who had volunteered to do so, a force of Channel Islanders to go and recapture the islands and a few more. More of those suggestions later. Some of his suggestions really did help.
He was absolutely furious that the Channel Islands had been surrendered and declared in the House of Lords that he would go to liberate the islands himself if he could despite being 80. He viewed the surrender of the islands as an act of cowardice or ‘poltroonery’ as he put it. He also viewed it as a risk that the axis countries would think that they might surrender other parts of the British Empire just as easily.
I am an old man, but I do not imagine that because the sands of life are running out those sands are less hallowed. They are hoarded with miserly care. But I say to this House with all honesty that if I could go tomorrow to submit to the bombardment with any chance whatever of recovering those islands, I would go, I would go today.
Lord Portsea’s speech in the House of Lords – as reported in Daily News (London) – Friday 02 August 1940.
He made sure that the plight of Channel Islanders was not lost in the media or Government circles. One imagines that if he had been alive in the age of social media, he would have been all over it. If we were to compare his campaign in the media of the 1940s with the current position of social media campaigns on behalf of Ukraine it would probably have been very similar.
Whilst talking about social media thanks to Dan Girard for reminding me on the local Facebook history group “Guernsey Days Gone By” that Lord Portsea was worth writing some more about.
If you are familiar with the constitutional position of the Channel Islands, we aren’t part of the United Kingdom, you will know that we don’t have an official representative in the House of Lords. If you aren’t familiar with the constitutional position and want to know more you can find it here. You are probably wondering why I gave the article the title I did given this situation all will be revealed in this post. Before we get into what he did I will set the scene with a bit about Portsea himself.
Who was he?
Sir Bertram Falle. Bart. chose the title of Lord Portsea of Portsmouth when he was created a peer in the New Year’s Honours list in 1934. His connection with the Channel Islands was that he was born and educated in Jersey.
He then went on to a career as a lawyer, judge and politician before being elevated to the Lords. He had also fought in the First World War and gained the rank of Major in the Royal Field Artillery.
At the outbreak of the war in 1939 he was two months away from his 80th Birthday.
He was known not to be a fan of the motor car and was the last member of either House of Parliament to arrive by carriage and pair. He had several carriages and disposed of the last one in in July 1942.
Lord Portsea being drive out of Old Palace Yard at the Houses of ParliamentPortsmouth Evening News – Saturday 18 July 1942Georgie and Ginger outside the house in Eaton Square, London c 1935
Anger & concern
At the top of the blog I mentioned that he was angry about what he viewed to be a cowardly act of leaving the islands undefended. You will find further down the blog quotes of his very eloquent speeches which illustrate quite how angry he was about the situation.
He was quick out of the blocks to speak on the subject and cause a fuss in the House of Lords just days after the islands were occupied. You can read about that here on my blog post from earlier this year.
This was followed by him expressing concern over the RAF bombing of the airport in Guernsey in August 1940 and lack of information available in respect of this.
Belfast News-Letter – Saturday 17 August 1940Sunday Mirror 11 August 1940 – Reporting on the 9 August Raid.
In January 1941 he again raised his concerns about the Government treatment of the Channel Islands.
Aberdeen Press and Journal – Wednesday 29 January 1941
As time went on he became particularly annoyed at the difficulty in communication between those in the UK and their friends and family who were still in the Channel Islands. I wrote a blog post about these difficulties which you can find here.
Hampshire Telegraph – Friday 14 February 1941
Now the eagle eyed among you will have noticed that his “telegram” would have actually been a short Red Cross message. Miss Falle was of course his younger sister who was still in Jersey.
Portsea continued to campaign for the islands to receive food aid and to reiterate the impact of the lack of information had on the morale of Channel Islands men serving in the armed forces.
Belfast Telegraph – Wednesday 22 April 1942
He even offered to supply a ship and would take it there himself.
Hampshire Telegraph – Friday 24 April 1942
By September 1942 he had written an article for the Weekly Dispatch (London) – which was published on Sunday 6th September 1942. His article again drew attention to the history of the Channel Islands, their connection with the Crown and the information he had about conditions. You can read it below.
His frustration continued in October 1942 at the news of deportations from the Channel Islands to internment camps on mainland Europe, again referring to the abandonment of the islands.
The Scotsman – Friday 09 October 1942
He continued to raise the prospect of food being sent to help the Channel Islands. Accused of being hysterical and that any aid would aid the enemy he was still ignored. He raised the prospect of women sailing ships to the islands.
Daily Mirror – Friday 19 March 1943
He compared the dropping of food parcels to Belgium with the fact they were unwilling to do so for British subjects in the Channel Islands.
The Scotsman – Wednesday 02 June 1943
Following D-Day he became even more concerned about the situation in the islands and when they might be liberated. Proposing a force of Channel Island troops to liberate the Islands. Now what he wouldn’t have been aware of was that there had already been plans to liberate one or all of the Islands that had been discounted for various reasons. You can read about them Operation Attaboy and Operation Blazing. There were also further plans under way which had begun as Operation Rankin and became Operation Nest Egg the ultimate liberation of the Islands.
Liverpool Daily Post – Wednesday 21 June 1944
He later raised the question of whether the Government would give the German garrison an opportunity to surrender. What is interesting is the timing of this question as he raised it just a matter of days after an attempt to get the garrison to surrender had been made. Major Chambers had attempted to negotiate a surrender, at great risk to himself which you can read about here on 22 September 1944.
The Scotsman – Thursday 05 October 1944
In January 1945 he had another falling out with Lord Munster in the House of Lords.
The Scotsman – Wednesday 31 January 1945
Following the liberation of the Channel Islands the King was welcomed to the House of Lords where he replied to the speeches given and acknowledged as noted in the article below.
Northern Whig – Friday 18 May 1945
What did he achieve?
Whilst some of his ideas were somewhat fanciful and not achievable he did manage some significant achievements.
His constant harrying of the government around the food situation in the Channel Islands undoubtedly helped with the eventual U-turn by the British Government in 1944 over the policy of not allowing food to be provided. See my post about “Let’em starve. No fighting. Let them rot at their leisure.”
Earlier on in the war, in May 1942, he managed to save the Channel Islands Monthly Review which was an extremely important publication to those Channel Islanders that were outside of the Islands. Many of them were spread across the UK and also away serving in the forces.
If you can imagine going from small closeknit island communities and then being spread across the United Kingdom, let alone the World, with none of the modern methods of communication for five years then you may begin to understand the importance of the publication.
LORD PORTSEA My Lords, I beg to ask the starred question that stands in my name. [The question was as follows: To ask his Majesty’s Government whether they are aware that the Stockport Channel Island Monthly Review has been ordered to cease publication on the ground of shortage of paper, and if they are aware that this small monthly publication is of great interest to Norman Islanders (of whom many are in His Majesty’s Forces) and whether the order can be rescinded.] LORD TEMPLEMORE My Lords, in the absence of my noble friend the Minister of Works and Buildings, I have been asked to reply. The Stockport Channel Island Monthly Review first appeared in May, 1941. The printing or publication in the United Kingdom of new periodicals has been prohibited since August, 1940, on account of the shortage of paper. It has been necessary to refuse permission to publish many new periodicals, including a number for circulation among persons in the Forces or affected by the war, and I regret that it is not possible to make an exception in the present case.
Hansard 12 May 1942 – Questions in the House of Lords
Now Portsea was not going to be fobbed off so easily and brought the matter back to the House again on 20th May 1942.
The review is the only real link between thousands of islanders who are serving His Majesty, their homes, their wives and their children. I have had a large number of letters from every part of the United Kingdom asking me to bring this matter before your Lordships.
He went on to share his anger at the treatment of Channel Islanders and how they were being treated differently to POWs.
The Government state that the review is not to be allowed to continue because it has not been in being within certain dates, that is to say, within two years; and yet a brand new magazine has had its first issue with Government sanction this very month—the first issue of a “new special monthly journal” to be sent free of charge to all those who are eligible for it. It is called The Prisoner of War. It was inaugurated in a fine speech by a Scot. He says:
“Loss of freedom is hard to bear to those who have lived as free men in a free country.”
Who so free as the Norman islander, a free man, a freeholder; no serf blood in his veins, not a drop! A free man with a thousand years of history, his soil untainted by the foot of a conqueror till now, when the Government have handed him over to the Germans, not for any fault of his own, not because he did not want to fight. As he says:
“It is hard for those who wait at home, aye, and fight, to go cheerfully to their daily tasks, knowing that someone dear to them is a prisoner.”
Now the people of these islands are, from my point of view, truly prisoners, not because they gave themselves up—oh, no!—not because they were unwilling to fight—the thousands now fighting prove that—not because they wished to give in, not because they were hands-uppers—we know how the Boers despised their hands-uppers—but because a Government of their own blood handed them over to the Germans. Surely they have a claim to decent treatment. Abandoned, deserted and betrayed, to cover up that shame some red herring is introduced, and they are spat upon.
His eloquent and staunch stance on the need for the continued publication of the Review undoubtedly saved it. The image gallery below shows an example of the publication.
The Lord Portsea Gift Fund provides financial help for educational training, re-training or specialised equipment to young people who want to further their careers in the United Kingdom armed services or the civil services in Jersey or the United Kingdom.
I hope you have found this an interesting account of a champion of the Channel Islands who often gets overlooked when it comes to the Occupation of the Channel Islands. Lord Portsea passed away on 1 November 1948 at his sister’s home in Jersey.
I hope that you have enjoyed reading the blog post.
I also co-host a podcast with Keith Pengelley in which we talk about the occupation of the Channel Islands month by month using first hand accounts, diaries and our research in the archives. You can find us on all the major podcast services. Just search “Islands at War” or visit our podcast page here.
You can also follow the blog on Twitter at @Fortress_Island where I share other information and photographs. If you prefer Facebook I also have a page there.
If you would like to receive email notifications of future blogs, you can sign up to the right of this blog post or here. Feel free to look around the website, where I have categorised posts to make them easier to find and other resources such as tours, places to visit and films that may be of interest.
You can also find articles, podcasts, TV appearances and other social media etc here.
I will be adding more as time permits. Thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope you enjoyed it. Please share it on social media or add a comment if you did. Feedback is always appreciated.
Also happy to be contacted with questions about the war in the Channel Islands, media appearances, podcasts etc.
This is the story of Richard Brook Sutcliffe a doctor and surgeon who lived through the occupation of Guernsey in the Channel Islands 1940 to 1945. He was known as Brook to his friends. The interview conducted by Conrad Wood for the Imperial War Museum provides a great insight into many aspects of the occupation of Guernsey 1940-45. If you want to listen to the interview it is here
This post comes with a warning that some of what he describes may be upsetting to some as he details some unpleasant things he witnessed. No individuals are named in the more unpleasant parts for obvious reasons.
He came to visit the Island in 1937 and was so taken with the place that he accepted the offer of becoming a partner in a local doctors practice.
A friend of mine, who was a surgeon, Simpson Smith, who was also a great friend of Dr. Montague, who was also in practice in Guernsey and he was looking for a partner.
He came to ask me whether I would consider coming over as they wanted somebody over here to join him. I came over here to have a look round and I was so much taken with it that I came over here and settled in practice with my wife and then three small children, which being in 1937, was just two years before we were occupied.
He recalls little of the evacuation of the Island other than his wife and three children travelling to England. His other recollection is interesting is the quandary that doctors living in the Islands faced at the time of evacuation.
It was difficult then to decide how many doctors we would need in the island, because that would depend upon entirely upon the number of people we had left in the island.
So we formed a committee, which consisted of Dr. Kerry, who was at that time a very highly respected one of our practitioners in Guernsey, Dr. Montague who was my senior partner and myself, and when anybody wish to leave the island, then they had to appear in front of that committee.
We would decide whether or not they could leave the island. Unfortunately, I’m not going to mention any names here, but unfortunately, despite the wishes of the committee, with regard to certain doctors, three of them left without our permission.
Newspaper announcing evacuation of Children
Unlike the doctors he doesn’t recall any of the nurses leaving the Island. I will be blogging about a nurses experience at a later date.
All the the people in charge of the nursing home and the hospital they all congregated into the country hospital which we then converted into what was known as emergency hospital and remained there of course.
During the height of the war they did a wonderful job of work. The person in charge of it was matron Hall who was the person in charge of the Victoria Hospital and of course we had the sisters who were in charge of the maternity hospital they ran that and I can’t speak too highly of the word they did. Absolutely wonderful.
When recalling the bombing of St Peter Port on 28th June 1940 he doesn’t recall much of the raid itself more the aftermath.
The only thing I remember is the noise that went on and the fact that we were at the hospital to receive the casualties.
We had people with abdominal wounds. We had people with legs, badly injured. We had every type of injury that you would expect. Somewhere between 30 and 35 of them.
Dr. Gibson, who was in the other surgeon in the Island and myself ran a theatre there and we did the majority of the operations during that night. We started the 10 o’clock at night and we finished at 10 o’clock the next morning, but we did have a small break for breakfast.
Two days after the raid he saw the Germans for the first time. They drove down the Grange as he was talking to his neighbour and friend outside of his house.
Jack Martel who was a lawyer over here a great friend of mine lived nearly opposite me. I lived in the Grange then in house which is now Kleinwort Benson and we were standing outside when the Germans drove past.
They’d just landed and they drove past in the police car, an old Wolseley. Jack said to me “Well Brook, they are here at last now” and I said “they are here at last Jack” and later on he said to me, do you know after we were liberated, he said to me “Brook do you remember the occasion when we were standing outside your house and the Germans came down and I said to you “well they are here at last and you said to me something. Do you remember what it was?” I said no. “You said to me well, I suppose Jack there’ll be here for anything up to five years. Which was exactly the time they were here.” I mean they weren’t here for a short time. We knew that I mean to take that length of time to get rid of them.
The house that he lived in and referred to as now being Kleinwort Benson has subsequently become the headquarters for Healthspan. The building has been extended to make office space and is on the Grange which is the main road into St Peter Port.
During the occupation he witnessed some awful things. One of his first interactions with them, other than seeing in the street, was being called to a patient who had been robbed and raped.
Well, the first impression I had of them was went in my meeting with the Major Müller who was then in charge of the the German forces when they arrived and I think I was one of the very few civilians who ever came in contact with him.
That was due to the fact that there was a patient of mine there were two sisters who run ran a sort of preparatory school in the island. They were both around about the age of 70. I had an emergency call to go to see them because one of them had been raped. They’d both been robbed and one of them been raped by a German soldier.
When I arrived, Mr. Sherwill was there, who was I think the Procureur. He later became the Bailiff Sir Ambrose Sherwill, who was sent away during the war to one of the camps in in Germany. Wonderful Bailiff, he was a wonderful man. When they knew that this person had been raped, of course a Major Müller was sent for and when he was told that this woman had been raped, he was absolutely livid. I’ve never seen a man so angry in my life. And he immediately summoned the whole of the forces to parade, he discovered the man with the missing revolver.
The following morning, I was sent for by the Germans, they collected me at my house, under armed escort with Mr. Sherwill, we were driven to the airport, where we were placed in a cottage on the perimeter of the airport to await the court martial.
We were then taken into the court martial and we gave our evidence. We were told that they would then return to tell us the verdict and we were then taken back to the cottage.
We were then taken back to the the court martial and we were told that he had been found guilty and he would be shot and would we like to see him shot. We told them we’d no desire to see anybody shot and to the best of my knowledge, he was then taken out onto the airport and shot.
Photo of from the Axis History Forum of Generalmajor Erich Müller
Müller was feared by his men and eventually shipped off to the eastern front, captured by the Russians and held in a POW camp until 19552.
It would seem that the doctor is correct that his sort of attack wasn’t that common as recalled in a post war report on policing.
It was very unusual to hear a soldier whistle after a woman in the street and during the whole period we only had two cases of rape – one occurred within the first week of the Occupation, and he was sentenced to death, the other some years later. We reported the facts to the German Police. The man was arrested and sentenced to five years imprisonment. He appealed and the sentence was changed to 8 years.
He notes that initially that health was pretty good and explains it as being because of the lack of alcohol and cigarettes. His reference to lack of alcohol and cigarettes is taken to be a reference to a restricted availability rather than none being available at all. Islanders improvised when tobacco became scare and either started growing it themselves or drying other leaves to use a substitute.
Whilst many accounts focus on what some called the ‘Hunger Winter’ of 1944/45 after the Normandy landings in June 1944 it is important to note that the lack of food had a serious impact some two years before this.
The interviewer asks about a picture he has been shown of a patient.
I have in front of me one of your photographs from the occupation of a patient’s lying in hospital and the patient really looks like somebody from the Belsen concentration camp and you’ve put on the back that this person was admitted on the 13th of May 1942.
So the starvation started as early as that, there were starvation cases well before the islands were cut off by the Normandy invasions?
Conrad Wood
He responds that they were very short of food and that it was the elderly that suffered the most. They were dropping like flies. The patient referred to in the photograph weighed just six stone five. In kilos that is just 40.5!
There’s nothing to do nothing at all. We had no food to give them. They were beyond doing anything.
I suppose under modern conditions where you had everything that you could give them that’s a very different kettle of fish. But then don’t forget we were we were isolated with nothing at all. We no antibiotics we had nothing.
We had to improvise, as I said, the present medical profession would think we were prehistoric. We managed it’s surprising what you can do you know what you got to do it.
He goes on to explain that this was an Island wide problem and that the lack of food was enough for a patient to die.
Particularly the old people, those people who couldn’t get anything on the black market or anything like that you see. They’re very independent you know. The Guernseyman is a very independent sort of person.
I have mentioned the fiercely independent nature and stubbornness and hence why to this day we are still known as “Guernsey Donkeys”.
It wasn’t just the Islanders that were suffering malnutrition during the occupation. Especially during the later stages the Germans were also suffering.
If you had a dog or a cat and you let it out at night it never came back in the morning because the Germans got hold of it killed it and ate it.
That’s the stage they were at. People had to put their cattle in at night for the fear of the Germans would go out and kill them and slaughter them. They were in a pretty poor state as well.
It got to the stage where the Germans were having to send out soldiers to guard locals crops and livestock. You can read more about the impact of the ‘Hunger Winter’ on my previous blog post of A German Soldier’s experience here.
Dr Sutcliffe wrote in April 1944 about the need to balance meat production, milk production, the health of the population, and future sales of cattle post war.
To sacrifice the general public in order to maintain a high standard of Island cattle for presumed post-war sale is nothing short of criminal …
Desirable as it may be to maintain a good Island stock, I consider it more desirable to maintain the population, and I am sure that this view would be shared by the many people who have been evacuated. They would rather come back to be greeted by a healthy relative than by a large and healthy herd of Guernsey cows.
Charles Cruickshank notes in his book that Admiral Hüffmeier, who succeeded von Schmettow as Commander-in-Chief of the Islands in February 1945, saw the dairy herds as the saviours of the Wehrmacht. Hüffmeier was determined to hold out for the Führer. He famously said to the Bailiff of Jersey Coutanche that he would hold out until “You and I are eating grass”.
He had no doubt that the garrison could hold out longer if the production of milk, butter, and cheese was kept up; and he was therefore against the slaughter of cattle to provide even the troops with a meat ration.
He proposed in the interests of the garrison that the civilian milk ration in Jersey should be converted from full to skimmed milk; but Coutanche5 successfully resisted this move.
When asked to explain the impact of the International Red Cross ship SS Vega delivering food during the last six months of the occupation he provides a very good explanation of how important it was.
Terrific. Terrific. It saved the island there’s no doubt about it. The Red Cross saved the island and I’ve got it on my film.
You’ve got film at the war museum of the Vega arriving and I remember that that time writing a letter to the to the local press saying how grateful we must be to the to the Vega for coming in at that stage and saving literally saving the island. I suggested at that time that every time that the Vega came in or whatever Red Cross ship it was that came in that the island should give, the Islanders who got a parcel, should give 10 pounds for every parcel.
They gave to the Red Cross and that would have given an enormous amount of money to the Red Cross people for literally coming and saving the lives of the islanders. I don’t know what they collected. I have no idea.
He recalls that he tried to limit his interactions with the Germans but he like many Islanders had Germans billeted in his house. One day they told him to get out of the house as they were taking it over. Now normally they would have official papers for this but these two didn’t. He therefore took matters into his own hands to get one up on them!
I had two officers put into my house and they behaved reasonably well, I suppose. One morning they came to me and said you must get out we are taking your house over. Now. At that time we had a billeting officer I’m trying to think of his name now major.
Anyway, it was usual. If the Germans took over a house, they would present you with official documents. They were very keen on official documents. You probably know the Germans were and when they came to me and said you must get out of the house. They didn’t present me with any official documents and I said well this is being done by themselves. They’re not doing this officially.
So I rang up a great friend of mine who was in removal man, Mr. Gould and I told him what was happening and he said, ‘right I will be around first thing in the morning’ and he turned up with his truck and we took everything out of the house.
I had an Aga cooker. and I rang up Huelins who were then the agents and I told Huelins and they said ‘We’ll be around doctor”. They came and they dismantled my Aga took the whole thing out and they put it in, down in my surgery in New Street, the house which was vacant and had been occupied by Dr. Montague.
So I moved in there and when the Germans got back that night they found nothing in the house. I had a very irate telephone call from them saying ‘you were removed the cooker and the curtains and everything else’. I said well, I understand you have a billeting officer Major Langer. If you get in touch with him, if he gives me orders to return things I will do so. I heard nothing more after that. I concluded they had done it off their own bat and I got away with it.
This type of behaviour by the Germans was not uncommon and there are many references to this behaviour.
We were surrounded by Germans and if they decided they wanted to they would come in and look around the house in case there was anything they wanted, because there were days when if they decided for example they wanted blankets, they would roll up to your house with a van, ring the bell and say right we are confiscating blankets and they’d strip your house of blankets.
Dorothy Hurrel-Langlois
When it comes to the impossibility of armed resistance he sums it up nicely. Although in respect of his thoughts on the Guernsey Underground News Service and Frank Falla I don’t agree with but that is his view point.
There’s no point in it actually and I mean, as I said, in France, you could blow a bridge up and be 50 miles away within an hour or two, but there really was no point.
I think people did silly things in a way we had I think a fellow called Falla who ran an underground newsreader thing, which I think was really quite unnecessary because so many people had crystal sets and sets they’re listened into and he was eventually caught doing this and then he was sent away to Germany to one of the one of the camps.
But news got round and then of course, we had the RAF drop leaflets here. I got the whole lot of them and I think they’re now in possession of the Imperial War Museum. News got round fairly quickly you know.
His views on propaganda produced is in line with all of the other sources that I have read. Very little impact.
When asked about collaboration he at first speaks about it but then says he doesn’t want to bring it up further.
Well, you’re bound to get a certain amount I think, personally, I think the amount of collaboration that went on in Guernsey was minimal. I know a lot of it has been made in this film they’ve had ‘The Swastika over the Channel Islands’, particularly in Jersey. I don’t think it’s done Jersey any good.
I can’t speak for Jersey. I know there were a number of babies, German babies born. It is more than likely I delivered some of them. But you’re bound to get that I mean what would it have been like?
Dammit look at the Americans in England. You’re bound to get that going on in an occupied territory. Look at France look at the whole of the occupied territories in Europe and compare them with the Channel Islands. This is bound to happen and I think to bring it up now is, I’ve no time for it, I’m sorry.
When asked about the experience as a whole he provides an interesting and thought provoking explanation.
I don’t know I suppose. A period of experience I think. In wartime one has to put up with many things that one doesn’t want.
My dear wife who’s now left me (she died before he was interviewed) was over in England with my three young children and I when I look back on it, she was bombed from here to there.
I think that apart from starvation, she’s probably had over a much worse time than I had. In wartime one’s got to put up with the certain things you’ve got to put up with and consider yourself lucky if you get through them. Fortunately, my wife and three children they got through them I got through it but that is war.
His take on the behaviour on the Germans and the occupation as a whole is in my opinion a fair statement given the lack of the more extreme aspects of the occupied European countries.
Could have been a lot worse. They suffered at the end you know, they (the Germans) were starving in the end.
Upon Liberation he used a Ciné-Kodak camera and colour film he had hidden to film the liberation which is above or you can watch the whole film here and the colour footage starts at 5:29.
After the war he continued to serve the Island for many years in a variety of roles. In particular he was instrumental in the development and extensions to the Hospital that still serves the Island today. You can read about this in his Obituary below.
A massive thank you to those that also pointed me in the direction of information for this blog.
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