237442 Tpr. Albert William Roe British Army Royal Armoured Corps from:Birmingham My father Albert Roe was taken prisoner in Libya, Fort Mechelli on 8 April 1941 and was incarcerated in Sulmona, Italy from May 1941 until September 1943 when he was rounded up by the Germans and sent in a cattle truck to Germany.
He was in Stalag IVc until the liberation of the camp by the Ukrainians. He was handed over to the Americans and his document of liberation by them is dated 20 May 1945. I have all the letters he sent from Sulmona and Stalag IVc, which he occasionally called IVB, which may have been the parent camp. All the letters are addressed to IVc and there is a disciplinary document marked IVc.
He worked in coal mines in Bohemia. Presumably these were open cast, though he did not say that they were. All the mines around Wistritz seem to be open cast.
He returned to England in the summer of 1945. On his return home his mother, who was not expecting him, did not recognise the person she had last seen in 1940. He had lost a great deal of hair and his teeth, soon to be extracted, were in terrible shape. He seldom talked about his experiences. There seemed to be a large number of nationalities and the Russians did not relish being freed by the Ukranian division. My father told me that the Russians shelled the camp before entering, killing several inmates, including one man, who the day before had been expressing his excitement at his forthcoming freedom. The Germans did not treat the Italians or the Slavs very well at all apparently. Conditions were bad for him too. It seems akin to slave labour there.
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