Wartime secrets and scandals

At the end of the last world war there were many stories doing the rounds. This is only one of many.

It concerns a young unmarried woman who complained that during the Occupation, she was raped by a German soldier. Her complaint was taken seriously by the German authorities, a military trial ensued, the soldier was found guilty and was shot. Whether his body was buried or not in the German cemetery at Fort George I don’t know.

Apparently after the war ended the woman told people that the rape never happened. She was ostracised by the Guernsey people, eventually leaving the island.

After all, right is right and wrong is wrong. There was a letter in our press written by a Jerseyman suggesting that women were safer during the Occupation than in the 1970s. The fact that a curfew was in place during the Occupation, meaning no civilian was allowed on the street at night, must have had something to do with it.

As I grew up I learnt why some women would have kept close company with the enemy. I well remember that some of the officers appeared like Greek gods, always clean shaven and in uniform. Nature being what it is, young people will be physically attracted to each other, to the extent that being an occupying force becomes to the individual concerned almost incidental.

Other local people who would have left Guernsey after the war with their tail between their legs, so to speak, because of their misdemeanours were certain members of Guernsey Police. Food was always in short supply, there were a few scams going on and a woman came to hear a few details about some policemen being involved. What could she do? She couldn’t go to the police, so she went to the Germans, who set a trap and caught a number of policemen in the act of stealing. It was quite a big thing. Some 20 people were arrested, not all police, and in the end 16 police ended up in court in 1942. Some were sent to prison in France, some in Germany, some were kept in our prison. One man died from injuries that he received while in a German prison. Many who had been sent away never recovered from the experience. The result was such that our honourable police force had disgraced themselves in front of the Germans. The delicate balance between the Germans and locals had been upset.

PC Lamy was put in charge of what was left of the police force, a man who was politically astute and also a man who retained ‘clean hands’ during the whole debacle.

Stealing from the German forces was considered OK but stealing from the civil population for profit was never on.

Some of the convicted policemen appealed to a British court after the war in an attempt to clear their names.

There was an incident when a family living near the Vale Mill took a slave worker in and gave him food and comfort – from what I can remember from my mother, the first time they were forgiven. But they did it again. Their punishment was to have all of their furniture taken outside to the yard and burnt.

If anyone can verify or disprove any of these stories I would be extremely grateful.

917anopinion935@gmail.com