1033 Philip Green As a former POW at Stalag 1VB, I can tell you that it is a fact we were liberated by Russian "Forces". Actually, four scruffy Cossacks, riding on four tired nags, ambled up to the gates of the camp from where all German guards had disappeared. Following their arrival, we were asked to remain in the camp until arrangements were made to hand us over to American forces who were to meet us on the other side of the Elbe, at a barracks town named Riesa. This was done at the end of April 1945. There was no transport and we had to walk the whole distance (about 15 miles). Arriving at Riesa, before the Americans arrived, the Russians surrounded the town and would not allow anyone out. This was the Russian's plan to have handed over to them, a more or less equal number of ex-Russian prisoners and slave workers. It took roughly a week to accomplish, and on the day announced, the Allied ex-prisoners gathered at a field that was garlanded with flags and bunting. Speeches were made by Russian and American officers, following which we marched out to a waiting convoy of American Army lorries (and boy! were we glad to get on them.) While the poor Russians shuffled off to what was subsequently known as a further period of incarceration at the dreaded Gulags. The reason for this? Because Stalin was paranoid about Russians who had been taken prisoner and slave workers who had been forced to work in Germany. Stalin reckoned, with his perverted logic, that while these people were in German hands they had been infected with Western ideas!
At any rate, I with many of my comrades were taken to Halle airport, given a meal that contained white bread!, which, after the black stuff given to us during our captivity, we believed to be cake! Then, off to Brussels and a day later RAF Cosford - England, home and beauty!
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