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Gunner Temple David William Symmons . Royal Navy HMS Penelope from Port Talbot
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GG Symonds . British Army GG Symonds served with the British Army. I have his unissued dogtags, made in preparation for deployment to the Far East and would love to get them home to his family. I am happy to cover all costs. If you are a family member or can put me in touch with them please get in touch. Update: Unfortunately The Wartime Memories Project are no longer in touch with Dan, his website, facebook page and email have all ceased to function. But if you can add any details about the person listed, please use the add to record link below.
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Dvr. Jack Symonds . British Army Royal Army Service Corps from Liverpool My father, Jack Symonds, was a prisoner of war in Stalag XXB. Unfortunately, he passed away on 30th December last year aged 96 and it is only recently that I began to do some further research on his wartime experiences. I guess this was prompted by the recent release of detailed information on British Army Prisoners of War 1939-1945. From this information, which confirmed his prison camp as Stalag XXB, on the Wartime Memories website there is a photograph of Harry Daniels, in which I am as certain as I can be also has a picture of my father. He is second from the right as you look at the photograph. I sent an email to Patricia Daniels (daughter of Harry). Unfortunately, the email has been returned to me as 'undeliverable', if Patricia reads this I would love to hear from you
His prison number was 15626 and he had been captured at St. Valery in France when the whole of the 51st Highland Division was captured. Father was a driver in the Royal Army Service Corps. He always told us that they were relatively well looked after and was eternally grateful for the tremendous work of the Red Cross. He also told us that the reason for their reasonable treatment was that the Germans wished to have some 'model' prisons that could be inspected by the Red Cross and others in order to divert attention away from the extermination camps, which as you will know were not very far away. You can imagine how much I wish I had this information to hand when father was still alive and to be able to show him the photographs and to be able to expand what we already knew. Dad was born in Liverpool and lived there all his life.
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Fl.Lt. John George Symons . Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve 207 Squadron from Wallington, Surrey (d.23rd May 1944)
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Pte. John Symons . British Army 6th Btn. Black Watch from Dundee (d.19th March 1944)
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Surg. Lt. Deryck R. Syred . Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve HMS Encounter My father, Surgeon Lieutenant Deryck R Syred RNVR, qualified as a medical practitioner in April 1940. He joined the Navy as soon as he was allowed to in July 1941 as Surgeon Lieutenant RNVR. He joined his ship, the Destroyer HMS Encounter, in January 1942 at Singapore.
His ship survived the First Battle of the Java Sea on 27th February 1942, but along with the famous cruiser HMS Exeter and the US destroyer USS Pope was sunk on the morning of 1st March 1942 in what I believe was called the Second Battle of the Java Sea. The ships had been trying to escape the Japanese, who far outnumbered them. Encounter's crew were ordered to abandon ship after she had run out of ammunition and had been disabled. After spending the rest of the day and all the following night clinging to a makeshift raft with eleven companions (one of whom was a Spaniel dog), my father was rescued by a Japanese destroyer. Most of Encounter's crew survived and were taken prisoner.
He was at first imprisoned at Macassar in the Celebes, but was transferred to Fukuoka No 2 POW camp in Nagasaki Harbour in October 1942, where he remained until the end of the war. He spent most of his time there caring for sick and injured allied prisoners, most of whom had to work in the nearby Mitsubishi shipyard under harsh conditions.
My father was listed as missing until March 1943, from which time he was in correspondence with his family, very intermittently, some letters taking over two years to reach their destination. He eventually arrived in England in November 1945 and was demobbed in September 1946. He died of a brain haemorrhage in 1954, shortly after his forty-first birthday.
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Joseph Alfred Syson . British Army Joseph Syson served with the British Army in WW2. I believe he served at Kempton Camp.
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Les Sysum . Royal Air Force My grandfather's name is Les Sysum, and I want to know if anybody remembers him. He was captured at Tobruk, spent time in Stalag IVB and was in the RAF.
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Lt. Mieczyslaw Ignacy "Mietek" Szczepanski . Polish Army 2PSP from Lwow I am posting this for my Beloved Grandfather, Mietek Szczepanski who passed as a naturalized Polish Citizen in 1976. He fought bravely during the September campaign and was help in 4 other camps beside this one. Below is the autobiography of sorts that he left me when he passed. It was kept from me for 35 years and I have translated it to basic English to make it easier.
Villingen 1st January 1951, My Story
I was born in Lvov on 31st of July 1905. After finishing primary and secondary school, and completing a state teacher training course, I was called up for National Service into the 26th Infantry Regiment in Lvov. I was in the army for 15 months: 9 months in training and 6 months active service. My training in the Reserves took place in the 2nd Regiment in Sanok. And at this time I completed a vocational course in bookbinding. Subsequently I thought this subject in primary school in the Lesko and Stryj areas.
I was called up for active service in to the 11th Infantry Division in Stanislawow where I took part in the September campaign of 1939. I was taken prisoner by the Germans in Rybkowice near Lvov. I was a Prisoner of War in Oflag VII in Murnau, Oberlangen, Hofnungstahl near Koln and Villingen.
After a war Villingen became my place of residence and remains so to date (1951). After the war I volunteered for service in the Donaueschingen Battalion. After this Unit was disbanded I worked in team 680 of the UNRA administration, thereafter I worked on childrens' summer camps with the YMCA and finally with the PDR until it ceased operation in Villingen.
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Capt. Albert Z. Szczepkowski . United States Army from Sarasota, FL Albert Szczepkowski was born in Torun, Poland and moved to America when he was 9. He joined the Army in 1943 and took classes at the University of Alabama while in boot camp nearby. Overseas he was wounded three times, twice by rifle fire and once by mortar shrapnel, was held as a prisoner of war. He told his son that one time he was he was lying in a trench in a field in France, his buddies were in retreat, but they had placed him there, hoping they could return to save him. But the soldier crossed over and kept going. In the house-to-house combat he and his buddies had once been captured. But the Germans had retreated, leaving the Americans behind.
By the time he was discharged in 1945, his son said, he was a captain who had declined a promotion in order to return to his college studies.
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Strzelec Jozef Szybkowski . Polish Army 3rd Coy. 37th Battalion from Morawce My great grandfather Jozef was conscripted into the Polish military in 1938, being assigned to the 37th 'Leczycki' Regiment located in the city of Kutno. Prior to this he had worked as a farm labourer in the village of Morawce. He participated in what is now known as 'The Battle of Bzura' or 'The Battle of Kutno'.
He surrendered along with the remainder of his regiment at Ilow on 18th September 1939. From here he was transferred to Stalag XA and designated as Prisoner No. 339P, where he remained until 5th January 1941, when he and seven other men from the camp were 'Released for civilian work' and assigned to a farm in the area of Handewitt, known as Handewitt Field, the employers' name was M. Clausen. Here he remained, and met my great grandmother Antonina Jeremenko, who had been deported from the occupied territory of Ukraine in 1943 as an 'Ostarbeiter' to perform domestic duties at the Clausen household.
When Flensburg fell to the allies they were placed in the Wentorf DP camp and married on 28th July 1945 in the Flensburg Registry Office. Over the course of the next few years the pair were transferred to various DP camps. Jozef joined the Civil Mixed Labour Organization and later the Watchman service within the British Zone, and Antonina gave birth to three children, one of whiom suffered an accidental death at the Wedel DP camp.
They had initially intended on leaving for Morawce, but decided otherwise because of the Soviet presence. They applied for assistance from the IRO and on 8th July 1950 they left Bremerhaven harbour aboard the SS Fairsea bound for Australia.
The family spent some time in a refugee camp at Somers in Victoria, where Jozef had to work on contract in exchange for the family's asylum. Eventually the family was released and they settled in a nearby town with three new children. Jozef returned to Poland for the first time in 1973 to attend his mother's funeral, he died in 1990.
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