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229496
Pte. Ernest Brearley
British Army Royal Artillery
from:Halifax
Ernest Brearley was my father.
His POW number was 1981 and he was at Stalag XXb Marienburg for a time during WW2. I have a couple of photographs of him in a prison camp and XXb is written on one of them. I know he was at various camps throughout his life as a prisoner of war which was six years, he was taken at the beginning of the war. He told me how he was marched to different camps, one of which was a sugar beet factory. I don't know which camp this was, but the local Germans would trade with the prisoners for sugar. Even some of the guards would escort them to the local cinema in exchange for stuff from the red cross parcels.
I think XXb Marienburg must have been his last camp. He used to tell me how the prisoners where led out of camp and marched for miles. Anyone falling behind etc, would be shot. Passing through a bombed out village one day he and his pal spotted a jar of dried peas in the window. At night they decided to try and sneak back to get it. While doing this they heard a noise like bees buzzing. This was getting ever louder. Eventually it became clear that it was the noise of the prisoners whispering. They were asking where the guards were going. The guards were running away. Shortly afterwards the Americans came along the road telling the prisoners to make their way in the direction the Americans had come and to find refuge somewhere as everything in that direction is now yours!
The Russian Army was heading toward Marienburg and the Germans were terrified of them. Prisoners were being begged to take residence in German households as the German civilians thought they would be safe from the Russian Army if they had a British or American soldier as a lodger.
My father had to walk for days before he found a farm that wasn't already full. He was there quite a while before he transported to Brussels. In Brussels the prisoners were housed, given money and an escort until they could be sent home.